Lights Out
by chrissie0707
Summary: An unexpected accident leaves the guys stranded in a small town and investigating a rumored urban legend that may be more rooted in fact than fiction. [drama, banter, whump]. Ch11 up.
1. Chapter 1

_Lights Out

* * *

_Chapter ___One

* * *

_

"What are you clacking away at over there?"

"I'm searching for suspicious occurrences in the area."

"Why?"

"I'm bored."

"Hey, I offered to let you drive."

Sam glanced up, eyebrows raised. "No, you didn't."

Dean shrugged, cracking a small smile. "Yeah, that doesn't sound like me."

Sam sighed and turned his attention back to the laptop, open on his lap, illuminating the interior of the car with a faint – and kind of creepy – bluish glow. Outside of the car, the creep factor was heightened by an eerily large and full moon lighting up the road with an equally eerie white blush.

"We're the middle of nowhere and you're telling me that you're getting a wireless signal?"

Sam nodded absently. "Yeah, we're probably close enough to a hotel. Or a Starbucks."

Dean gave an exaggerated mock of Sam's sigh and rotated his neck. He almost (_almost_) wished he _had_ offered to let Sam drive. They hadn't stopped in at least four hours, and his arms – and other parts – were getting stiff.

What if he just…no. Not gonna happen.

Dean chewed on his bottom lip. It wasn't exactly a nervous habit, just something he did unconsciously when he was thinking thoughts usually running somewhere along the line of 'I can't _believe_ I'm about to do this.' He opened his mouth but shut it quickly, rolling his eyes in frustration. After a few moments, Dean finally lost the battle with himself. "You wanna – "

"No."

"Sam."

"Nope." Sam looked up from his laptop and with a shit-eating grin stretched lazily in the passenger seat, extending his lanky limbs as far as the interior of the Impala would allow for the sole purpose of pissing his brother off. And it worked.

"Bitch," Dean muttered under his breath, switching hands on the wheel to shake out his increasingly numb right one. He glanced down at the glowing green numbers of the clock on the dash. It was nearing two a.m. and Dean was in desperate need of a strong cup of coffee. Unfortunately, there wasn't a rest stop in sight. Or any sign of civilization, really. He vaguely remembered passing a sign for a town a few miles back, but it wasn't visible from the road. There were just woodsy trees on both sides, tinted white in a heavy sheen of moonlight.

They were driving through some part of southern Illinois, with nowhere in particular in mind for their next stop. It had been a couple of days since their dad has sent any coordinates their way, and for this reason, Dean had actually contemplated taking a few extra days in that shitty motel room in Podunkville, Wisconsin for a little R&R. For about thirty-seven seconds. Then he thought about what his dad would say. It was always better to be on the move, and ready for whatever came their way next.

Sam had tried to argue this point, saying there was no logical explanation in that – if they were moving around, weren't they likely to be _less_ prepared? Not wanting to have this same fight _again_, Dean only responded "You lost me at 'logical'" and tossed his bag into the trunk of the car.

Dean frowned and wiggled on the bench seat, readjusting his body as he started to lose feeling in his ass. "Sam – "

"Not a chance."

Biting back a guttural roar of frustration, Dean released a long breath and reached over to turn up the volume of the stereo. Over the loudly thumping bass, he heard Sam give a small, triumphant laugh, which only served to aggravate Dean further. "You findin' anything over there, Chuckles?"

Sam shrugged and waved a hand dismissively at the computer's screen. "I dunno. Police reports show a lot of drunk drivers in the county, but nothing more exciting than that."

"Drunk drivers?"

"Yeah, people losing control of their cars, driving off of the highway…stuff like that…"

Dean had asked, but he wasn't really listening to Sam; his attention had been drawn to a dark shape approaching from the opposite direction. The light from the full moon clearly outlined some kind of car (Dean squinted – older model, seventies maybe), driving down the highway without its headlights on.

"Would you look at this idiot?" Dean asked, shaking his head.

Sam looked up as Dean reached down and hit his own lights, flashing the predetermined idiot twice with his high beams. Both watched the car pass, Dean in the rearview mirror and Sam turning his body to look over the bench seat, and both sighed as they lost sight of the vehicle around a bend, lights still off.

Dean gave Sam a sideways glance. "Drunk drivers, huh?"

Sam shrugged. "Must not be a lot to do around here." He shifted his laptop to one side and dug into his jacket pocket, pulling out his cell phone. "We should call it in, before they hurt someone. Could you tell what kind of car it was?"

But Dean was again not listening to Sam, but staring into the rearview mirror. He frowned and squinted. He could have sworn there was something following them – at a safe distance, but still following them – but couldn't make out a shape in the dark well enough to be sure, even with the ample moonlight.

"What?"

Dean shook his head at Sam's question. After a moment, he turned his eyes back to the road. "Nothing. Thought I saw something." After once final glance in the rearview, he let out a breath and rubbed at his tired eyes.

Sam cocked his head, bringing his cell phone to his ear, preparing to do the valiant little bother thing he did oh-so-well. "Do you wanna – "

"No. Nah, I'm good."

Sam nodded and reached out with his left arm. "Can we at least turn down the rad – "

Suddenly, the car lurched forward and a sound somewhere between a thump and a crack echoed through the car as it was hit from behind, jostling and displacing its occupants.

Dean had already been preparing to slap Sam's hand away from _his_ radio knobs, and his hold on the steering wheel perhaps hadn't been ideal for the unanticipated ram into the back fender. He now found his hands sticky and slipping down the sides of the wheel as they worked to find a strong grip. He looked down, instantly connecting the wetness sliding under his fingers and the tickling sensation running down his face, not to mention his now-blurry vision. He brought a hand up to the cut at his hairline, hissing as his palm made contact. "Sam?"

"Yeah." Sam's voice was strong, and Dean took his eyes off of the road long enough to see that Sam was more pissed than shaken, again twisted in his seatbelt, squinting out of the rear window, his cell phone clutched in one white-knuckled hand, muttering various curses to himself.

"What the hell was that?" Dean asked, gripping the wheel with his left hand, his right still pressed to his forehead. He looked up at the rearview mirror, and shook his head slightly. He couldn't focus enough to see a damn thing, but couldn't be driving too badly, or Sam would have already grabbed the wheel from him. Still, he eased up considerably on the accelerator.

"I don't know." He shook his head. "I can't tell – "

Sam was cut off by a second unexpected ram that seemed to come out of nowhere, and he threw his arms out to brace himself on the dash as he was flung against his seatbelt, losing his cell phone in the process. "What the _hell_?"

Dean managed to keep his head from striking the steering wheel a second time, but this next round of lurching did nothing helpful for the throbbing already there. "Son of a bitch!" he shouted, slamming a fist into the wheel. Yeah, his head hurt, but there were more important things to worry about. Like what in the _hell_ did this _asshole_ think he was doing to Dean's car?

Sam was twisting wildly in his seat, trying to get a good look at who or _what_ever it was battering their car. _MY car. _His pursed lips and narrowed eyes told Dean he was having about as much luck, or lack thereof, as he himself had had.

A pair of headlights suddenly flashed to life directly behind them, and both brothers squinched their eyes shut momentarily from the brightness.

Dean peeled his eyes open, and through vision blurred by blood, they widened as they watched the vehicle behind them roar as it pulled even with them on his side. "Not a chance in hell," he muttered to himself, and pressed harder on the gas. The engine of the other car growled and the vehicle's speed increased as well.

"Dean."

"I know."

"_Dean_."

"I SEE it, Sam!"

But due to vision compromised by the blurry eyes, the knock on the head, or the combination of both, Dean misjudged the gap between the two vehicles and wasn't prepared for the other car to swerve to the left and then hard to the right, bashing into the rear door on the his side with a bone-jarring crash, sending the Impala into a nauseating one-eighty turn that abruptly ended when the driver side of the car slammed into the guardrail.

* * *

There was no slow dissolve into consciousness. Dean's head snapped up quickly and forcefully, eyes the size of dinner plates. It took a little longer than he would have liked for the world to right itself, and for him to figure out just where he was and what the hell was going on. There were now two points of throbbing on his skull, and it felt his brain was leaking out of the left side of his head, thanks to a fun little smack against the window. There was something in his eyes giving the outside world a red tint, and he groaned, because as soon as he was aware of it the oozing gash on his forehead was sure as hell making itself known again.

He raised his right hand slightly and bowed his head the rest of the way into it, closing his eyes against a sudden wave of nausea. He felt like his stomach was lodged somewhere in his throat, and like his head was going to roll right off of his shoulders and into his lap. "Sam, I think something might have happened to the car," he said with something of a crazed bark of laughter.

When he received no answer from his brother, Dean turned his head slightly to the right, to the passenger seat. The _empty _passenger seat.

Before this could fully register in his mind, the small movement pulled his shoulders and Dean bit back quite the unmanly yelp at a sharp pull in his left wrist. He looked down dumbly at the limb, wanting to know how he could have been awake for a few minutes already and not fucking noticed how his HAND was caught between the steering wheel and the now-cradled-in door. And not just a little stuck.

It was obvious that his watch was not going to be salvageable, and Dean wasn't sure that he was going to _want_ to salvage the little fucker, not when it was now molded to his skin. It pinched and stung, and Dean could feel warm drips running down his forearm. He tugged gingerly on the hand, pulling from his shoulder, and when that didn't accomplish anything but grating the small bones together and further scraping the skin off of his wrist, he pulled a little less gingerly, wrapping the fingers of his right hand firmly around his forearm. Nothing.

"Awesome," Dean muttered to himself, using his right hand to wipe the blood out of his eyes so that he could better inspect his predicament. "Sam," he said, wincing as he tried to rotate his wrist, "I think I'm gonna need a hand here. No pun intended..."

Dean leaned his head back against the seat and looked to the right. And that's when it hit him that Sam wasn't in the car. _Empty _passenger seat. "Sam?" Not quite panicked yet.

The passenger side door was wide open, a chilly breeze making its way into the car. "Sammy?" A little more panicky.

Dean bolted upright and tugged on his hand with all the strength that he could muster, using his intimate familiarity with English curses to quell the unnatural twinges, aches, pulls, stings, and throbs that he was creating in his wrist. If some fucker wanted to take his little brother right from under his nose, there was going to be hell to pay…as soon as he got out of the _fucking_ _car_...

"Dean?"

Dean wrenched so hard on his wrist that for a moment, he was sure that he had snapped it clean off, turning again to the right, to the sound of Sam's voice. "Sam? Where the hell – "

"I called for help. Had to find my phone first, and then I had to walk a little down the road to get a signal." Sam leaned into the car through the open door and braced himself on the bench seat, eyes wide, looking a little pale in the moonlight, but otherwise unharmed. "Paramedics are on their way."

Dean frowned. "Para wha - ?"

"Dean, you're trapped in the car." The pitch in Sam's voice was high, like he barely keeping himself together, and Dean couldn't really see the reason. _He _was the one with his own car trying to bite his hand off.

"Well, thank you, Captain Obvious," Dean said, his lip curling. "Now help me get outta here." He turned his full attention back to his ensnared hand. Now that he knew that Sam was okay it was back to hurting like a bitch. He tried a new tactic and, muttering a small apology to his baby, tried to pull on the steering wheel. He growled in frustration, and was ready to thump his head against the cursed wheel when he felt a firm hand on his shoulder and spun as well as he could to find Sam hovering in his personal space.

"Get offa me," he snarled, chucking Sam's hand off with a shaky throw of his shoulder.

The hand was instantly back on his arm. "You're going to make it worse."

"_You're_ going to make it worse," Dean mumbled half-heartedly, giving one final tug on the wheel. With a "fuck it" that was barely above a whisper, he flung his head back against the seat and closed his eyes, unable to keep the worry at bay, unable to keep the burning question in any longer. "How's it look?"

He could feel Sam hovering again as he crawled across the seat and cautiously leaned over him. "I don't...I mean, it LOOKS broken, but a doctor – "

"Sam. How's it look?" he repeated firmly, prying his eyes open enough to give Sam a pointed glare. Sam said nothing. "Sam?"

Silence.

"Sammy. Man."

Sam sighed. "It's not good, Dean. The back bumper is...and I mean, obviously, the driver's side..."

"Ah, no," Dean said, shaking his head. "_Dammit._"

"Dean, I know how you feel about the car, but I think we have more important things to worry about right now."

Dean glared. "I'm going to pretend you didn't just say that."

* * *

To be continued...


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

* * *

Spending an hour and a half on a small stiff bed in a small-town emergency room and having a hefty (or at least what he would allow them to give him) amount of drugs in his system apparently didn't make Dean any more of a pleasant person to be around. Sam felt a pang of sympathy for the nurse curtained into the cubicle with his brother. When she came stomping into the waiting room, she looked like she was ready to rip the head off of a teddy bear.

"Is there someone here with Mr. Cohen?" she asked, her tone making it sound more like a threat. Like, dear GOD, someone come claim this man.

Sam stood somewhat stiffly and smiled tentatively. "That would be me. He's my brother."

"I'm sorry," she said icily, shoving a chart and pen into his hands, and that sympathetic pang quickly disappeared. "Did you already get the insurance squared away?" she asked, tone of voice a mix of boredom and just downright bitchiness.

"Uh, yeah," Sam said, feeling the ever-present stab of guilt his brother and father had always lacked when it came to insurance and credit card fraud. True, a cast, a couple stitches and a CAT scan weren't quite going to rack up the total Dean's _last_ trip to the hospital had cost someone else, but it didn't mean Sam felt okay about it.

"Okay then." The nurse ripped the chart from his hands while he was still in mid-scrawl of a sloppy signature of his alias for the night. She ran cold blue eyes over the papers on the clipboard. "Was your brother drinking tonight?"

Sam frowned at the question, remembering what he'd read online about drunk drivers in the area. "No."

The nurse just gave him a look, and snorted. "Yeah, okay."

"Look," Sam said, his frown deepening, defenses rising, "we were run off of the road."

"Do you know how often we hear that, son?" A new voice sounded in the room, and Sam turned to see a tall, thin man clad in a pretty plain uniform, clearly an officer from the badge and nameplate on his chest. "What? Did you hear a story? Think you could use it as an excuse for your carelessness and poor judgment?" The man crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes at Sam.

Sam was rapidly losing his patience with the situation. "Look, if you don't believe me, give him a breathalyzer," Sam said, not bothering with formalities. Even as he said it, he knew it wasn't going to happen, not in a town this small. If it looked like a drunk driving accident, it was a drunk driving accident. "Can I see my brother now?"

The officer cocked his head and stared at Sam for a moment, but then nodded at the nurse. Not taking his narrowed eyes off of Sam, he started to back down the hall towards the exit. Sam had a feeling that it wasn't the last time he was going to hear from him.

"Your brother's CAT scan didn't show anything worth worrying about," she said, sounding bored. "He's just going to have a headache for a few days. Dr. Tomlinson is just checking in on him again before releasing him."

Sam watched as she eyed the signature he had just scribbled, and hoped they would be out of town before the insurance went through and the subsequent phone calls were made. "Can I see him now?"

She nodded and gestured down the short hallway. "He's in the first room on the right," she said shortly.

Sam crossed his arms as though he was participating in some casual conversation with a friend. "So what made you get into the healthcare profession? Your ability to connect with people?" He was embarrassed before the words had completely left his mouth. God, Dean was rubbing off on him more and more every day.

The nurse didn't even blink. "He's in the first room on the right," she repeated flatly.

Sam mumbled an apology and took long strides down the hall, his face flushing.

* * *

There were several reasons Dean was not a happy camper.

One would be the damned plaster cast now encasing his left wrist and hand. It was heavy and itchy and was just going to get in the way if he had to clobber someone or something. There was _no_ way that bitch was staying attached to his arm for four weeks.

Two would be the yet-to-be-determined state of his car. Dean was going crazy. He didn't even know where the car _was_, let alone the condition it was in. He only prayed Sam had had the common sense to stay with the tow truck and keep the trunk locked. Dean hoped this had been the case, as he didn't recall seeing him in the ambulance – that part was already growing fuzzy in his head, which felt like it had been subbed in for a volleyball.

Three was he had no _fucking_ clue what had happened out on the highway. Besides the obvious. Someone had rammed into the car, into _his _precious baby, THREE times and had taken them out. OUT. Dean would have smacked himself in the forehead if it weren't for the six stitches that had taken up residence there. How could he have not seen the car coming? How could he have not found some way to out-maneuver the psycho driver hell-bent on running them off the road?

Four was the wrinkly, pretentious looking doctor gazing at him annoyingly over the top of his glasses. Dean _hated_ when people did that. And he was just _done_ waiting around and sitting in this hospital. He had places to be. Cars to check up on. Other cars to hunt down.

"Can I get outta here yet?"

"Just a few more minutes, Mr. Cohen." The doctor talked amiably with Dean, like he had been in the room the whole time, when in reality this was the first time in the hour and a half he'd been in the ER he had seen a doctor. Dr. Tomlinson looked down at his chart and scanned the page with that patent patient look that doctors had. "Could you tell me your name?"

Dean looked at the man dumbly. He blinked. "My name?"

The doctor once again gazed at him over the top of his glasses. "Yes, your first name."

"Wha…?" Dean's mouth started to form a question, _any_ question, anything to distract the man long enough for Sam to _get his ass_ in the room. However, with his mind still fuzzy around the edges, he was drawing a blank.

The doctor was now doing the patent patient gaze with a little less pretention, and a little more concern. "It's just a quick check of your mental faculties. You took a couple of pretty nasty knocks on the head there, and your brother said that you lost consciousness."

Fucking Sam. "Believe me, I've had worse," Dean muttered, straining his neck to try to see around the partition. Where in the _hell _was Sam? Didn't he know the rules of the game? They were supposed to run interference for each other before the name question came up. Especially when the brother in question didn't even know what the hell friggin' name he was supposed to be using. He'd managed to hold the frigid nurse off with winning smiles and other avoidance tactics, but he didn't get the impression that would work here.

Sam, by the grace of God, chose this moment to slide into the curtained-off room with his 'I'm Sam, I'm doofy' grin. As Sam shook hands with the doctor, Dean shot him a look he hoped communicated exactly what he was thinking. _When I get out of this bed,_ _I am gonna smack the HELL outta you…_

Dr. Tomlinson turned away from Sam and again focused his doctor-y eyes on Dean.

Dean grinned. "My name?"

"Your name."

Behind the doctor, Sam's eyes widened, and Dean could practically see the light bulb go on. _Gonna smack him SO hard._ Sam reached up and touched his head. Dean frowned, countering the movement instantly with another smile for the doctor. Sam coughed and ran a hand through his...

"Harry," Dean said quickly.

Dr. Tomlinson's hand paused over his chart, and he eyed Dean carefully. "Okay," he said after a moment. He spent another minute scribbling, a minute that Dean spent shooting Sam death looks, and ripped a sheet of paper off of a smaller pad. "This is a prescription for some pain killers – "

"I'm good," Dean said quickly.

Sam stepped forward to take the paper, rolling his eyes at his brother. "Thank you, doctor."

As soon as the doctor was out of earshot, Dean leaned forward and addressed Sam harshly. "Okay, two things. One, what the hell? And two, _what _the _hell_?"

"I'm sorry," Sam said, moving to grab Dean's jacket, which he immediately wrenched out of his younger brother's hands. "I was stuck in the waiting room. You know, filling out bogus insurance information."

"Don't try that guilt trip bull on me, Sam. I didn't even want to come here."

"I'm not letting you walk around with a broken wrist."

Dean struggled to get his jacket on one-handed. "Oh, I didn't know that I needed your permission."

Provoked, Sam continued on in a tone remarkable similar to his brother's. "Oh yeah, and then there's the thing where the cops were here. They think you were _drunk_."

Dean froze, eyes narrowed. "They've got nothing."

"Yeah, well, I don't think that really matters around here." Sam stepped forward to help Dean with his jacket, and received an elbow in the stomach for his troubles. He stepped back. "We just need to find a place to stay tonight, and then we need to try to find out what the hell ran us of the road."

"Dodge Dart Demon. Which narrows the model year down to '71 or '72." Dean chewed the inside of his cheek thoughtfully for a moment. "I'm gonna say '71. 340 package. 275 horsepower."

Sam stared at his brother. "I thought you couldn't see the car?"

Dean hopped off of the bed, titling his head and wincing slightly. "No, but I could hear it."

"And you could tell all of that?" Sam sounded genuinely awestruck.

"Dude," Dean said with a frown, still awkwardly pulling his jacket sleeve over his casted wrist. "There's no way you're not a chick."

* * *

Nurse Ice Water for Blood had been nice enough to call a cab for the two of them, seeing as how their car was out of commission; or had at least just been that anxious to get them out of her emergency room. Either way, there was a rusty taxi that had maybe once been yellow waiting at the curb when Sam and Dean exited the automatic sliding doors and stepped out once again into the chilly early morning air. Sam eyed the dented vehicle suspiciously.

"You guys need a place for the night?" the cabbie asked, his voice low, gruff, and stuttered as he spoke around the glowing cigarette teetering on his lips.

"Yeah," Sam answered, rubbing a hand over his tired eyes. What time _was_ it? "Cheap is good."

In less than ten minutes they had managed to traverse the entirety of the small town, and the cab pulled to a stop somewhere near the end of what Sam assumed to be the town's main road - there were a few small paint-chipped houses, and other equally small and paint-chipped buildings. He looked out of his window to see the Wishing Well Motel, its neon sign sporadically blinking in and out. It looked to have only four or five rooms, doors lined close together in one impressively small and dingy building.

"Cheap as they come," the cabbie said, exhaling a puff of smoke. "'Bout forty bucks a night."

Sam's heart fell at the sight of the decrepit building. He glanced over at Dean for confirmation, but his brother only shrugged, his eyes saying 'whatever, dude,' and popped open the creaky car door. So Sam followed suit, and seeing Dean was already making his way slowly across the motel's parking lot, handed the driver a wrinkled bill from his sparsely populated wallet. "Thank you."

They approached the chipped door at the left-end of a row of chipped doors, with a sign that read "office" hanging over it. The entire town was in dire need of a touch-up. Sam elbowed Dean. "I don't suppose you have a credit card to match the insurance information I just used?"

Dean shot Sam a questioning look, blinking tiredly.

"We can't go by one name at the hospital and another at the motel," Sam explained, exasperated. "That's just asking for it."

Dean sighed and paused in front of the office door, groping in his back pocket. Whipping open the broken-in leather wallet, he shoved a wad of bills into Sam's palm. "Here. This'll cover tonight."

Sam shot a look at his brother's now empty wallet. "What if we need more? It's going to take more than one day to fix the Im – "

"Relax. I'll take care of it." Dean was already starting down the sidewalk, albeit a little shakily, in the direction of quite the shithole-looking establishment, bright neon lighting offering hopes of "dollar drafts", and more importantly, "pool hall".

Sam threw his arms out. "How are you expecting to get the money playing with one hand?"

"I'll figure it out."

There was no doubt in Sam's mind Dean would 'figure it out', but he put on his 'logical bother' outfit and shook his head, stepping forward with what he hoped was an authoritative air. "No, Dean. It's four o'clock in the morning. You probably have a concuss...you need to get some sleep."

Dean stopped and dropped his hands heavily to his sides. He turned to address Sam, his voice dripping with its usual sarcasm. "Look. Just get a room, have yourself a nice long bubble bath, and I'll be back in an hour."

Sam narrowed his eyes at his brother's back as Dean turned and stalked away, muttering something under his breath that sounded a lot like "freakin' GIRL."

It was the moments like these that made his murder attempt in the Roosevelt Asylum a little more understandable.

* * *

To be continued...


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

* * *

Sam stalked gloomily into the office to get a room from the unpleasant motel manager – it was becoming apparent that the buildings weren't the only thing in this town that needed a touch-up. However, he didn't take a bubble bath, nor did he go to sleep. When Dean pushed the door open at a quarter after five, Sam was sitting on one of the dingy twin beds, one leg drawn up under him, laptop open on the bedspread. He didn't even look up when Dean entered. "How'd you make out?"

He glanced over when Dean plopped heavily onto the other bed, but kept his mouth shut and pretended he didn't see Dean wince and rotate his plastered arm. "Not too bad, considering. Not exactly sure how I'm gonna cover the cost of the car repairs, but we should be able to stay in town for a few days if we need to." He shrugged out of his leather jacket with a grimace, being mindful of the cast on his wrist. "Why are you awake?"

Sam glanced at him over the top of his computer. "I was trying to find something out about that car that tried to take us out."

"And?" Finally managing to get his jacket sleeve over the plaster cast, Dean went to work on his boots next, the laces proving to be a bit problematic, but being Dean, he would 'figure it out'.

"Remember what I said before, about all those drunk drivers?"

"Vaguely." Rid of his jacket and boots, Dean fell back onto the flat pillows with a sigh, throwing his right arm over his eyes, his left flung heavily out to the side.

"It looks like all of those incidents happened on the same stretch of highway. Within a few miles of where we were run off."

"S'it haunted?" Dean asked, his voice muffled by the arm covering his face.

"I don't know," Sam said, leaning back against the headboard. "I mean, I've Googled all of the obvious things...and there is one thing that keeps popping up." He said this tentatively, knowing Dean wasn't going to like it.

"What's that?"

"You're not gonna believe me."

Dean grunted and pulled himself up into a sitting position, bracing his elbow on his knee and holding his head in his hand. "What?"

Sam turned the laptop so that Dean could see the window open on the screen. Dean squinted across the distance between the two beds. He shook his head. "I can't read it from here."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Then come over here."

"You come over here."

Sam gave Dean an 'are you kidding me with this?' look. Dean stared him down, and Sam knew who was going to win before he even returned the glare. "You're such a _baby_," he grumbled as he heaved himself off of his bed and crossed the whole _three feet_ Dean hadn't wanted to move.

He would have thrown the laptop onto his brother's lap if Dean hadn't grabbed it out of his hands before he had the chance, scooting back to rest against the headboard. He read the page on the computer and barked a short laugh. "Sam, this is an urban legend, and a _stupid_ one at that…"

Sam crossed his arms defensively. "There are a lot of similarities. I think it's worth looking into."

Dean tapped his right forefinger on the top of the computer, using his cast to brace it on his lap. "'Lights out'," he said dramatically, reading from the screen. Sam glared, and Dean shrugged. He continued to read, mouthing the words silently to himself, and after a moment looked up at Sam with a cocky grin. "Yeah, lots of similarities, except this legend started in _Canada._"

Sam narrowed his eyes, jerked the computer away from his brother and walked back to his bed, sitting heavily on the edge.

"We're not in Canada, Sam."

"I didn't say it was _exact – _"

"Oh, yeah, and we weren't gunned down by gang members," Dean continued with a smirk, completely ignoring Sam's attempt to explain.

"Dean, it's the same thing," Sam said loudly, _making _Dean listen to him.

Dean didn't. Instead he sat forward and started to tick items off on his fingers. "No, it's not. Let's recap. Not in Canada. Not gunned down – "

"There was a car driving down the highway without its headlights on, you flashed them – " here, Sam held up a hand to keep Dean from making a joke, " – and then we were run off of the road."

Beat. "Yeah, but not with guns."

"Will you get off of the gun thing already? We know better than anyone that urban legends evolve with the times."

Dean was silent for a moment. And just as Sam was starting to think he was getting something through to his brother, Dean yawned widely and blinked at the alarm clock on the table between the beds. "This is all very fascinating, but can we do this in the morning?"

Sam sighed. It _was_ five-thirty in the morning. "Yeah." He stood and set the laptop on the small, wobbly table by the door. Before he had turned back around, Dean was already sprawled on his bed, arm once again flung over his eyes. Sam was suddenly hit with just how tired he himself was, and he hit the lights, flopping onto his own bed.

After being awake for nearly twenty-four straight hours, the hard mattress beneath him was like heaven. So he was fairly agitated when his brother's voice sounded across the room.

"Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"Where are we, anyway?"

If it weren't for everything they'd already been through that night, he'd have chucked a pillow, or maybe something a little heavier, at him.

* * *

"What do you want me to do, kid?" the grossly large man asked with a sneer, wiping his hands on the chest of his coveralls, leaving smears of grease, oil, and mayonnaise on the dark blue fabric. "It ain't exactly a Ford Taurus."

Bernie, as it turns out, was just as much the opposite of sunshine and puppies as the other inhabitants of Claremont. Sam recalled him sounding much more personable over the phone, which was weird, considering he had called the mechanic at about three o' clock that morning from the waiting room in the hospital. His choices had been to make the call in the wee morning hours and risk pissing someone off something fierce, or lose his mind or possibly a limb if he went another "fucking minute without doing something about the _car_, Sammy." Maybe the prospect of incoming cash was enough to get even the biggest jackasses to sound pleasant for five minutes.

Bernie certainly wasn't being pleasant now. Dean's nostrils were flaring, and from a glance Sam could swear he saw a spark of fire ignite somewhere in the pupil of his brother's right eye. "Just. Fix. It," he gritted out.

Bernie chuckled and shuffled his weight over to a large toolbox in the corner of the tiny garage. "With what? My secret stash of old model car parts?" He grabbed a towel from the top of the toolbox and continued to wipe his hands, running the edge underneath his fingernails to capture the morning's grime. "You're bringing me a '67 Chevy, boy. This ain't Sears Auto Store. I'm gonna need some time."

Dean shot a quick glance at his baby, nestled lopsidedly in the middle of Bernie's garage, where it had been towed while he was in the emergency room getting stitched, x-rayed, and casted. The rear bumper was hanging on the left side, and had dragged the whole twenty miles from the highway to the garage with a sparking screech. Sam was only happy Dean hadn't been there to witness the sight or the sound of his precious car literally dragging its ass to the body shop.

And the bumper was in GOOD condition, compared to the rest of the car. Dean had yelled, cursed, threatened, and finally pleaded with those who hasd responded to the accident, but with his hand caught the way it was, they had taken the door. He told them to just take the goddamn steering wheel out, but they had calmly (through clenched teeth) informed him they would prefer to pull the door out than to pull the wheel up and risk further damage to his left arm. He called them candy asses, and Sam a little bitch for letting them do it.

Even auto-illiterate Sam could see there was no saving the door, resting up against the wall next to the car. The entire left side of the car was scratched – deep rusty metallic drags defacing the smooth, shiny black paint – but the mangled door was beyond a little hammering and a paint job. It was toast. It was why Bernie wasn't going to be able to turn the keys back over to Dean until at least Monday.

It was Thursday.

And that was when the spark became a flame, and the arguing started. Sam quietly excused himself and waited outside with his laptop tucked under his arm, listening to the raised voices of his brother and the greasy mechanic from the curb, chatting up a smelly drunk who'd taken up residence outside the garage.

It was a good twenty minutes before Dean stalked out of the body shop and into the mid-morning sun, grumbling under his breath. Sam caught a few words and phrases as they started down the street. Things like "fucker", "shower", and "ain't rocket science." Even as he huffed angrily, he rotated his casted wrist, scowling to cover his winces.

And Sam knew it was just the _worst_ timing in the world, but as he stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and felt the crumpled slip of paper there, he knew he had to try. "So, I was thinking we could stop by the pharmacy and then get something to eat." He tried to package the stop for Dean's painkillers with the thought of food, hoping that Dean's brain would just bypass the mention of the medicine and skip to "eat", agreeing with whatever Sam had said.

Instead, Dean's brain bypassed both ideas, and went straight to sarcasm. "Yeah? You outta Midol?" he deadpanned.

"Dean."

"Oh, look. Food."

Sam looked up ahead, and sure enough, there was a diner. He sighed. _Must be Thursday._

Another small town, another rundown motel, another cheap diner. And this one didn't even have a _name_, just a knotted wooden sign balanced precariously on an equally knotted wooden post, reading 'Diner.' _How original. _He was really getting tired of doing this again. Of the lifestyle they led, if it could even be called that.

Sam opened his mouth to voice this to his brother, to maybe suggest that they just walk for a bit and try to find a Wendy's, or something else NORMAL, but Dean was already shouldering the door to the restaurant. "Coming, Sammy?"

"Sam," he grumbled under his breath, pushing open the door.

The establishment was pretty plain, and looked straight out of some kind of cheap seventies horror flick. No bigger than a double-wide trailer, with scratched tables, split upholstery, and waitress in pale yellow uniforms, complete with stained white aprons tied around their waists. There was even an ancient looking jukebox standing in one corner, though Sam doubted that the thing had worked in years; there had to be a good half an inch of dust coating the top.

He followed Dean to a booth in the far corner of the restaurant, and they quickly ordered big breakfasts, doing more eating and coffee-guzzling than talking. Sam caught Dean several times rubbing his temple or forehead when he thought Sam wasn't looking, not to mention how his wrist must have been feeling. Sam made a mental note to fill the prescription in his pocket as soon as he got the chance, even he was going to have to force the pills down his brother's throat.

He was in the middle of picking through a plate of eggs and sausage when their waitress came up to the table, sliding their check onto the once-polished surface and holding a pot of coffee. Dean quickly gestured to his empty cup.

"You boys going to be staying in Claremont long?" the waitress asked, pouring Dean his third cup of lukewarm coffee, in that diner-waitress-expert way of holding the pot so high above the cup that it was impossible not to stare at the steaming stream of dark liquid making its foot-long trip.

"Yeah, a few days," Sam answered.

The waitress, Ginger, according to her name tag, placed a long-nailed hand on a wide hip. "We don't get too many visitors around here."

"Yeah, well, we're not visiting," Dean said stiffly, grabbing his refilled cup and immediately draining half of it.

Sam shot an apologetic look at Ginger, who waved it off. "Don't sweat it, honey. I get a lot worse." She placed a hand lightly on Sam's shoulder as she walked away.

"Make me look like the bad guy," Dean grumbled, twirling a fork in the middle of his plate of pancakes. Except for comments like these, he had been near-silent all morning; sulking, mostly. And when he wasn't, he was doing his damnedest to make sure Sam's day was going to be hell. It didn't take a genius to figure out why. There were a lot of factors up in the air. Between his head, wrist, and the state of his car, Dean wasn't having a great morning. They had only managed to clock in about four hours of sleep. Sam knew that they both could have used a lot more, Dean especially, but he was itching to figure out what had happened the night before and get the hell outta Dodge.

And speaking of itching…

"Would you stop scratching? You're driving me crazy."

"Yeah?" Dean asked, not looking up from his current project – digging deep trenches into his forearm. "Short trip?"

Sam ignored him, choosing instead to take a long drink from his own slightly steamy cup of coffee.

"Can you even _taste_ the coffee in that? I swear, you put so much shit in it."

Sam knew Dean was uncomfortable, and had a lot on his mind, so he let that one slide, too. Dean was taking his frustrations out on his little brother, not the first time it had happened and mostly certainly not going to be the last, and although it was irritating as _hell_, Sam was willing to take it.

Sam leaned forward, crossing his arms on the tabletop. "Are we going to talk about this yet?"

"About your dumbass theory? Sure." Dean continued to scratch furiously, wriggling his fingers underneath the edge of his cast.

Sam pursed his lips and reached over to smack Dean's hand.

"It's itchy as hell," his big brother complained, but he complied and sat back, crossing his arms, channeling his discomfort by making a face.

Sam took it as a go-ahead. "Okay," he said. "I got some info while you were 'talking' with the mechanic – "

Dean groaned, but missed the pointed comment. "Please don't tell me you're using that drunk guy out front as a credible source."

Sam jabbed his forefinger on the table for emphasis. "He said this has happened before. Lots of times. All of those 'drunk drivers' I read about."

Dean shook his head, opening his mouth to argue, but Sam didn't give him the chance. "Dean, that's exactly what they thought happened with us, remember? It's the same thing every time."

Dean resumed playing with his half-eaten breakfast, using the cast on his left hand to knead into his temple. "So what did the smelly drunk guy tell you?"

"Okay," Sam said again, gearing up. He dragged the laptop off of the seat next to him and opened it up on the table between them, shoving their plates out of the way. Dean made a few sounds of protest, but Sam pointed out he hadn't eaten more than a few bites. Sam felt their booth in the back had just enough privacy to talk quietly about the accident. "Earl – "

"The drunk?"

"Yes, the drunk. He told me this happens randomly every few weeks or so, always on highway 50."

"And they always peg the driver as a drunk?" Dean asked, taking another sip of his cooling coffee. He seemed to be taking a lot of offense to the drunk thing. Sam knew why; Dean would never risk the Impala, not to mention other human lives, by driving it in a condition he shouldn't be driving in.

"Yeah. And they're not always as lucky as we were. I don't think a BAL is something they bother with around here. If they even bother with autopsies at all, that is." Sam hit a few keys on the computer, bringing up the pages he had searched and bookmarked the night before. "I gotta tell you, Dean, a lot of the things he told me are pretty parallel to this urban legend."

"Come on, Sam. We've been over this. This 'lights out' legend…" Dean made finger-quotes with his right hand, "It started in Canada, man. Off and on for the last twenty-odd years, and every time it pops up again, no matter where in the country, it's the same thing." Dean leaned back in his seat, preparing to deliver a lecture. "A supposed initiation ritual for the Blood gang, and incoming members drive around at night without their headlights, and the first person that flashes their lights at them, they're supposed to kill 'em. With _guns_," he emphasized. "Besides, it's totally bogus."

Sam wasn't convinced. "Did it feel bogus last night, slamming into the guardrail like that?"

"Look," Dean said, "I'm not saying that _something_ weird didn't happen last night…I'm just not sure this is a good lead."

Sam chewed on his lip for a moment, and gazed out of the diner window. When he turned back, his face was set. "It's all we've got."

It was Dean's turn to stare out of the grimy, streaked window, shaking his head, but Sam could see he was relenting to his "dumbass" theory. He sighed, long and loud and Sam was pretty sure it was just to let him know he still had his doubts. "You say there're survivors?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah."

Another moment passed. "Give me some names."

* * *

To be continued...


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

* * *

Dean took a long drink from his paper to-go cup and grimaced, holding it at arm's length like it was contaminated. "I think they brewed this shit with cold water."

"It wouldn't brew if they used cold water, Dean."

"Okay, Sam. Because I was being serious."

Sam took a deep breath and counted to ten in his head. It was usually the only thing that got him through days like this. The days he would swear there was a nine-year-old trapped in Dean's adult body.

Dean chucked the coffee cup – already his fifth of the day - into an overflowing trash can outside the diner and shoved his right hand into his jacket pocket, his heavy left hand swinging at his side.

"You wanna stop and pick up those pills?"

"Hmm? I'm sorry, did you say something?"

Sam sighed. Yep, it was definitely going to be one of _those_ days. "No."

Dean raised his eyebrows approvingly. "So what's the plan?"

He was anxious to get the whole thing figured out and get out of there, and Sam got that; he wanted out to. "The waitress said there was a library down the street." He took a quick scan of the buildings around him and his face fell. "Old" didn't even begin to cover it. "Hoping for a microfiche might be asking too much, but there should at least be a printer we can use."

"Research," Dean said, making a face and scratching at his arm. "Joy."

Sam smacked his hand and Dean immediately gave him a backhanded whack to the upper arm with a growled 'Get off.'.

"Gotta start somewhere," Sam said with a glare, rubbing his arm. "And besides, it's not like we have anything else to do."

Four blocks from the diner, they found the library the waitress had told them about; "library" being a term used loosely. There was a plaque on the façade that said 'Claremont City Library', sure, but that wall was part of a long building that looked to house several business suites, strip mall-style. Not exactly your typical public library. The brothers paused on the sidewalk in front of the door.

"Huh," Sam said.

Dean shrugged and was moving to open the door when a voice stopped them.

"Boys." The deep voice, maybe meant to carry some kind of greeting but was laced with warning and an air of disapproval, sounded from behind them. The brothers turned to find themselves face-to-face with the tall, aging officer that Sam had encountered in the emergency room the night before.

Having not seen the man at the hospital, Dean looked confused, so Sam plastered on his best innocent baby-faced smile and opened his mouth to greet the officer, only to close it dumbly when he realized he didn't know the man's name.

The gray-haired man cracked a small smile, though there was nothing pleasant in the expression – it was a declaration of power. "Nate DeWitt," he said, extending his hand to each brother; there was likewise no friendliness in the gesture. Each shake was firm. Once up, once down, back to center with an authoritative squeeze. "Don't believe I caught you boys' names last night."

Sam leapt into action, fearing Dean would have already forgotten the name he was supposed to be using. "I'm Sam," he said, "and this is my brother, Harry."

Dean rolled his eyes, and Sam gave him a quick and not-so-discrete elbow to the side. "He's not so good with people," he explained to the officer with an apologetic smile.

DeWitt cocked an eyebrow and took a breath, studying them. "Look, boys," he said after a long, uncomfortably silent moment, "it's pretty much just me runnin' things here in town. If there's a problem, it's on my ass to take care of it."

Dean opened his mouth to speak, and received another jab in the ribs. Sam winced at the pointed "_ow_" and glare shot his way, knowing that he was going to get _smoked_ as soon as the officer was out of eyesight, but he didn't want to risk any of Dean's smartass remarks right now.

If Nate noticed the exchange of brotherly love, he didn't show it. He hooked his thumbs in his belt loops, drawing attention to the gun holstered to his hip, not that either Winchester found it to be that impressive. "Now, boys," (the continued lack of use of their names was not lost on the brothers – it was a blatant sign of disrespect, and Sam knew that it was grating on Dean's nerves) "I'm not entirely sure what happened out on the highway last night – "

"Then why don't you ask us," Dean interrupted.

Sam inwardly groaned. Did his brother have no verbal restraint whatsoever?

DeWitt gave a tight smile. "I've got a good enough idea." He surveyed the two brothers for a moment. "I don't like strangers in my town. I want you two to listen to me very carefully." He paused to make sure he had their attention. He at least had Sam's; Dean was in the middle of some kind of eye-rolling marathon. "Get your car fixed, and get to where you're going. Don't stick around here."

Sam started to reply, something nice and polite, but Dean stepped on his foot before he got any words out. "Believe me, we're not planning on it," he said icily.

The only response was another appraising raise of the eyebrows.

"Something sure sucked the fun outta this town," Dean muttered to Sam as they moved past Deputy DeWitt. Not quiet enough, though, as a hand gripped his upper arm.

"Yeah, something did," DeWitt said, seething, his mouth pulled into a deep frown, accentuating the lines in his weathered face. "And you two are a part of it." He released Dean's arm roughly and stalked through the door to the police station, just next door to the library, slamming it hard enough to rattle windows all down the side of the building.

Sam and Dean exchanged looks for a moment before Sam shook his head, lips pursed. "Nice," he said, pushing his way past his brother and into the library. "Real nice."

* * *

"What's this chick's name again?" Dean asked two hours later as they approached a pale blue aluminum-sided house. It was small and old, yes – but not in the dingy, dinky, rotted and rusty way that the rest of the town was small and old. The house was…quaint. And, God help him…cute. It was very well-kept, taking into consideration the state of the other buildings they had encountered during their stay in Claremont thus far.

"Laurel Aronson," Sam said. He pulled a folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket and handed it over to Dean.

Their pit stop at the "library" had lasted longer than either would have liked; they stuck around so long more out of avoiding Nate DeWitt than getting that much information. Sam had revisited some of the sites he had found the night before, printing out pages, and Dean had looked up the names Sam gave him to see if anyone was still in the area, but for the most part…they had just been bored.

Over the past twenty years, there had been seemingly countless accidents – enough that Dean was surprised it hadn't been brought to their attention before. There had been several survivors of the attacks, but only one still lived in town. Laurel Aronson. She had been nineteen when the darkened car had run her off the highway fifteen years ago.

"She sounds hot." Dean took the print out and scanned it, raising his eyebrows over the top of his sunglasses.

"She's almost ten years older than you."

Dean shrugged, grinning. He gestured with the paper in his hand – a newspaper article fifteen years old, complete with a picture. "If she's hot…"

Sam shook his head and grabbed the paper out of Dean's hand. "Can we focus here, Dean?"

"Yeah, yeah."

They continued up the walk to the house. The two had only been roaming Claremont's streets for a few hours, and Dean was already damn sick of walking. They maybe could have taken a cab, but why waste money they didn't have to begin with? He missed his car. One day, and he missed his car. Just knowing his baby was sitting broken and helpless in a strange place, with a stranger's hands on her…it was enough to make his skin crawl.

Sam winced and rubbed the back of his head, causing Dean to smirk. The little punk had it coming, after those jabs. Dean reached the porch of the house first and rapped twice on the door. The door opened after only a few seconds, and an attractive blonde head poked out of the opening. "Can I help you?"

Dean smiled broadly. "I'm sure you can." It was like a reflex. A very good reflex. The woman laughed lightly and ducked her head.

Sam rolled his eyes. "Are you Laurel Aronson?" he asked.

"Yeah…" Laurel's soft brown eyes studied both men on her front porch. "You guys salesmen or something?"

"Uh, no." Sam held out the newspaper article. "We were kinda hoping to talk to you about this."

She scanned the paper and looked up sharply, scrutinizing eyes pausing on Dean's stitches and cast. They widened and she nodded knowingly. "You guys were in the accident last night."

Dean raised his eyebrows. News traveled fast around here. "Yeah," was the simultaneous answer from both brothers.

She opened the door wider. "Come in."

* * *

"It was freaky as hell," Laurel said with a shaky laugh, wrapping her palms around her oversized coffee mug, clutching it like a lifeline. A ceramic lifeline with a cat painted on it.

They were settled in her cozy living room; the most welcoming interior they had been in in quite some time. Sam and Dean sat on the couch, and Laurel was curled in an overstuffed chair, one leg drawn up under her. A large calico cat lay at the chair legs, purring contently but staring at the guys through squinted eyes.

"I was driving home from a friend's, over in the next town. I was on highway 50 when I saw the car," she continued, "and I flashed my lights. Whoever they were, they didn't turn their lights on, just kept driving. When…when I saw the car behind me, I thought it was the police at first. You know, like maybe they were clocking and thought I was trying to warn another driver…you're not supposed to do that."

Sam and Dean nodded, encouraging her to go on. Dean took a sip from his own cat-adorned mug. It was hot, and he was grateful beyond words that she had offered. Even so much that he could forgive the vanilla twinge tainting it.

Laurel shook her head, her friendly eyes darkening. "Definitely not the police. Hit the back of my car first, like a warning shot or something. And then the car ran me off of the road." She rubbed at her upper left arm. "Right through the guardrail. I don't think they ever really fixed it right…"

"Did you see what kind of car it was?" Dean asked. "Model, color, anything?"

She shook her head. "No, it was pretty late. Too dark to make anything out."

Dean nodded, but he was growing increasingly frustrated. This wasn't helping. And this running cars off the road pattern was just pushing Sam's stupid urban legend theory even further down.

"What did the police say?" Sam asked, sipping loudly from his cup. He probably even _liked_ the vanilla. _Girl._

Laurel rolled her eyes and sighed. "That I had been at a party. Drinking. Actually gave me a damn ticket. They wouldn't listen to me." She shook her head, biting her lip. "You know, this happens a lot, but the cops never do anything about it. Nate's just…there's no benefit of the doubt, you know?"

Dean nodded. "Yeah, I'm getting that."

Sam leaned forward, bracing his forearms on his thighs. "I have to ask…everyone else that survived this 'phantom driver', they moved away. But you didn't."

Laurel gave a small smile and shrugged her shoulders. "I'd lived here my whole life. My friends and family are here. I wasn't going to let something like that drive me out of my home, you know?"

Dean swallowed hard and gave Laurel a tight smile. He didn't look over at Sam, but heard him clear his throat and shift uncomfortably on the couch beside him.

Laurel's smile faded. "Did I say something wrong?"

"No," they both answered, too quickly. For an excruciating four minutes, the only sound in the room was the cat purring.

"Thanks for your help," Dean said when he couldn't take it anymore, his voice coming out somewhat hollow.

Laurel nodded and averted her eyes, taking a sip from her mug.

It was pretty apparent to all parties the conversation had died. Laurel didn't know what it was she had said, but she kept looking back and forth between Dean and Sam with an apologetic look, which they both brushed off with fake smiles they always managed to muster up when needed. She let them out, giving them her number in case there was anything else she could do to help.

"What now?" Sam asked once the door has shut behind them.

Dean absently rubbed at his stitches. "I don't know. Go back to your drunk friend?"

Sam gave his patented huff-and-eye-roll and started down the walk. Dean followed with a smile.

They hadn't made it a block before a low rumble sounded between them. Dean looked over to see Sam rubbing his stomach. "You're hungry already?" he asked incredulously. Sam just glared. "Yeah, me too." Dean scratched absently at his left arm, just above the lip of cast. "Why don't you get some food, and I'll meet you back at the room."

"How very gracious of you to offer," Sam said dryly.

Dean pulled a wrinkled twenty out of his wallet and slapped it against Sam's chest. "I do what I can, little brother. I do what I can."

* * *

It took nearly a full minute for Sam to get the motel room door unlocked. Balancing two bags of greasy takeout and a carrier with two large cups, he had to bend his arm at an unnatural angle to get the key into the lock, grumbling under his breath about _why_ his brother couldn't just come _open_ the door for him.

The door popped open and he gave it a kick to ensure it stayed open long enough for him to enter the room. Sam winced as it swung forcefully into the wall, the doorknob smacking into the surface with a loud crack.

Dean, standing in the middle of the room, jumped and dropped something that clattered on the floor. "Shit, Sam. You scared the hell outta me."

"Wha…?" As if _that_ wasn't weird enough in itself, Sam followed the sound of the clatter to where a small object had landed on the floor by Dean's feet. Sam let the bags and the cup carrier slide from his arms onto the table and took a step forward, pointing to the ground. "Is that my toothbrush?"

"I didn't…no."

Sam bent down and picked the toothbrush up. "Yes, it is, Dean. The blue one's mine."

"Huh." Dean looked up at him with the biggest, fakest innocent smile. "Oops."

"'Oops?' What were you…" And then he noticed Dean was practically breaking the fingers on his right hand at the middle knuckle trying to work them down under the hard edge of his plaster cast. "Dean, I swear to _God_…"

Dean didn't even look up, just continued to rip away at his skin. "You have NO idea, dude."

"You were scratching with _my_ _toothbrush?_"

"I wasn't gonna use _mine_."

"Oh, well, when you put it like _that_." Sam grabbed one of the paper bags off of the table and chucked it onto Dean's midsection, causing his brother to stop scratching and cradle in to keep his precious burger off of the floor. He looked up, shooting daggers Sam's direction.

"We're trading toothbrushes, dude," Sam said, all seriousness, as he sank onto his bed, drawing his own bag of greasy fried delight up next to him and pulling his laptop onto his lap. He jerked open the bag and stuffed a handful of fries into his mouth as he opened the browser, spending a few blissfully quiet moments continuing his research and feeding his fast-food craving.

And then there it was.

"Sam?"

Sam gave a jerk of his head but refused to look up, acknowledging his brother was trying to get his attention, and dismissing it just as quickly. _Don't wanna talk to you…_

"Sammy?"

Sam threw his head back in aggravation, letting it thunk lightly against the headboard of his bed. Dean's tone was pure 'I want something', and Sam was just not in the helping kind of mood after the toothbrush incident. "What."

"You, uh, you think you can give me a hand here?"

Sam looked over to see his older brother, prouder than anyone he'd _ever_ met, standing in the middle of the room with a sheepish, embarrassed, uncomfortable grin on his face, refusing to make eye contact. Sam frowned. "With what?"

Dean grimaced. "I kinda…"

"What?"

Dean took a breath and picked up a fry from his sandwich wrapper, spread open on his bed. "I kinda…" he looked away and gestured with the fry, making an up and down motion along his left forearm, like he was scratching.

As Sam got it, a smile broke out so big across his face that it physically hurt. It was just too good. He quickly pulled his lips over the grin, and tried to make his face as serious as possible. "I don't get it, Dean."

"Dude, don't be a bitch."

"What ever are you talking about?"

Dean scowled, obviously thinking murderous thoughts, but Sam just sat and crossed his arms, waiting.

After a moment, Dean gave a frustrated sigh and let his arms flop to his sides. Knowing that for all of the 'Sammy's, for all of the 'bitch's, the 'pussy's, for all of the smacks across the back of the head and all of the pillows in the face…he deserved this. He deserved Sam making him say it out loud. "I got a fry stuck in my cast, okay? Happy?"

* * *

To be continued...


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

* * *

Six-thirty came way too soon. It wasn't as though he was _trying_ to wake up so early on such a consistent basis; he wasn't _trying_ to run himself down, at least not on any kind of conscious level. God only knew what his subconscious was up to these days. The fact just remained he still wasn't sleeping well. For months now his mind had decided that anywhere between two and four hours of sleep was enough to keep him going for another day.

As he stared, wide-awake but with a _killer_ headache, at the water-damaged motel ceiling above his head, Sam and his stiff muscles had to disagree. This was not normal. Not that there was really ANYTHING about his current lifestyle that was normal, but this whole not sleeping thing? Not even a little bit.

A light snore from across the room let him know Dean was having something of an easier time, and Sam found himself jealous of his brother's most recent knock on the head. At least he was getting some sleep. Sam turned his head to the left, and sure enough, his big brother was sprawled like a kid, limbs all over the place, in a position that was certainly not going to seem so comfortable when he woke up.

Sam experimentally shut his eyes, to see if maybe, just maybe there was a chance he could get in a few more hours. Hell, he'd settle for a few more _minutes. _But no, nothing happened. It felt like nothing more than an extended blink. So, suppressing a groan that would surely wake his brother, as nearly every sound did, Sam pulled himself up and out of bed, definitely feeling the accident in his still-sore arms and back.

Sam moved slowly and silently across the motel room towards the bathroom. He shut the door, allowing only the faintest 'click' before he flipped on the light. He stood in front of the mirror, bracing his arms with flattened palms against either edge of the sink as he let out a sudden, mammoth yawn. Sure, now that he was UP he was tired. Made perfect sense. Shaking it off, Sam ran a hand through his hair, grimacing at the greasy feeling left on his fingertips. Priority one for the day had just become a shower. With a quick hygienic inventory in which he ran his tongue over the fuzzy slippers that had appeared overnight on his teeth, he found a shower wasn't the only thing that he needed.

Sam stifled another yawn with his left hand as his right groped around the top of the sink for his newly acquired toothbrush. When his fingers closed around the plastic handle, however, he saw that what he held was not the fire engine-red toothbrush he had literally wrestled out of the Dean's hands…well, _hand_…the night before, but his poor defiled blue one.

Sam cocked his head, and spun slowly, taking in the whole of the too-small bathroom and its meager contents. Bar of soap, near-empty shampoo bottle, towels, half of them in a pile on the floor, courtesy of his not-so-neat brother…and one toothbrush. The tainted one he held in his hand.

Sam shook his head. He had it coming. Although, with a big brother like Dean, it seemed he _always_ had it coming. Dean had swiped the red one out of the bathroom after Sam had fallen asleep. Could the situation GET more juvenile than this?

"Morning, buttercup," came a call from the other side of the door.

Yes. Yes, it could.

Sam threw the door open and stepped out into the room. Dean was sitting on the edge of his bed, left arm lying across his lap. "Where's my toothbrush, Dean?"

To his credit, Dean's face was picture-perfect ignorance and innocence. "It's in your hand, Sammy."

"Dean, this is _stupid._"

"So then stop being a baby and just brush your teeth." He wrinkled his nose. "God knows you need it. Or a Tic-Tac." He scratched at the skin just above the top of his cast, then reached out his hand, wagging his fingers and nodding at the toothbrush. "Hey, lemme see that."

It was time to count to ten again, and by seven Sam had decided it was just too early for this. It was too early for Dean. He frowned. It really _was _too early for Dean. "Why are you awake?"

"Why are you?"

It was hardly an innocent question, but an accusation. It was the 'you gonna tell me what's going on in your head, say, _ever_?' he had been hearing in various wording for months.

And it was dismissed just as quickly as it always was. "I just am," Sam said, turning back and tossing the toothbrush into the bathroom's plastic trash can. He didn't have to be facing Dean to see his reaction. He had seen it enough. That triple-threat combination of eye roll, head shake, and lip-pursing that was just textbook annoyed-Dean.

"Whatever, Sammy," Dean muttered. It was tired and angry, surrendering with an unspoken 'I just don't have the patience or energy for this right now,' and Sam would almost feel guilty if not for the disappearing toothbrush act and the crack about his morning breath. Almost.

Instead, he shot back an irritated "Whatever, Dean," and shut the bathroom door.

* * *

It seemed an act as simple as closing the bathroom door had put up not only a physical, but a metaphorical barrier between the brothers. It hadn't been the greatest way to start the morning, and it had set the tone for the rest of the day. It just happened sometimes; they were brothers, and being brothers wasn't always about keeping secrets and giving pointers and standing up to the various bullies of life for one another. It was about knowing just what buttons to push to set the other off. It was about taking cheap shots and not pulling punches. It was about being an asshole just for the hell of it.

Annoyance evolved into frustration, and it didn't take long for frustration to become "just shut the fuck UP already!", and Sam and Dean spent a good part of the day being snippy and short with each other, the results ranging from Dean asking for a price check a Barbie toothbrush for Sam at the drug store, to Sam coming up and putting his arm around his brother while he chatted up the cute counter girl. He was going to have a headache for a week from the slap to the back of the head he had received for that one, but it had been worth it see Dean's ears turn that shade of burning red.

They had returned to the motel room in varied states of annoyance and residual embarrassment, and had sat silently for hours, each pouring over different forms of media, researching and fuming at the same time.

It was eight o'clock that night when Sam, not finding any new or useful information about the town or phantom car, had let out a frustrated sigh, and Dean threw a stack of papers aside and declared he couldn't spend another minute in that godforsaken motel room doing research with such a mopey _girl_ and he needed a drink.

Moping or not, Sam got the feeling that Dean would "need" a drink no matter what, and was just taking the opportunity for one last jab. And he knew it was going to be the last jab, because Dean gave him the look. The one Sam read to say 'we've had our fun and I'm still ticked about the thing with the counter girl but it's too quiet in here and I'm going crazy.'

Sam nodded. He wanted to point out Dean really shouldn't be drinking alcohol when he was taking pain medication, but then he would have to admit to the fact he had not only picked up the prescription while Dean had been busy wooing the counter girl at the drug store, but had crushed up a pill and poured the powder into Dean's soda can when he had been in the bathroom earlier. When he had sworn to himself to get the meds into Dean's system if he had to force them, he hadn't been playing. And he wasn't the least bit sorry for the deception – though he hadn't stopped scratching for more than thirty seconds all day, Dean hadn't winced as much that afternoon.

That had been nearly six hours earlier, enough time for the single pill (he figured the full effects of two would be too noticeable) to work its way through Dean's resilient system, so Sam kept his mouth shut. He shut his lap top and said he was going with him, which won him another eye roll and a "Don't need a chaperone, Sam." But he did, because one pill or not, Sam wasn't so sure of what the effects were going to be.

He moved to make one last small note on his pad of paper, but he couldn't find it. He shuffled a few papers around, but came up with nothing. "Dean, have you seen my pen?"

"Uh, yeah. I, uh, borrowed it."

Sam looked over at his brother, who was suspiciously hiding his left arm as best he could, twisting awkwardly in his cross-legged position on his bed. "Do I even want to know?"

Dean gave a crooked grin and held his arm out. "I tried to get mine out…and then I couldn't get this one out either."

Sure enough, there was the very tip of his pen's cap poking out from underneath Dean's cast. Sam couldn't keep his laugh in. "How do you even _do_ that?"

Dean quickly tucked his arm back behind him, scowling. "It's not funny, Sam. I really can't get them out."

Sam laughed harder, bracing his arms on the edge of the bed. "Wait, you really have _two _pens in there? That _is_ funny."

"Are you gonna help me or are you gonna be an asshole?"

"Hold on a sec." Sam flopped around onto his stomach and reached over the opposite side of the bed, groping on the floor for his discarded jacket. He found the pocket he was looking for, and victoriously came up with his cell phone. He hit the button for the camera feature and swung back around, grinning like a fool.

Dean's eyes were narrow slits of death threats. "Don't even think about it."

"Just one," Sam pleaded.

Dean shook his head. "Hell no, Sam. Just – "

_Snap._

* * *

They walked down the street to the same bar where two nights before Dean had miraculously secured the funding for their stay in town.

Dean continued to dig his nails into his arm as they walked the couple blocks. "Gonna just cut my fucking arm off," he mumbled to himself. Dean had tackled Sam, easily pinned him, and held his face into the carpet – right arm twisting his brother's behind his back and his weighted left digging into the back of Sam's head – until he had deleted the picture.

He had released Sam and stood up, rubbing his arm. "Winchester men aren't blackmailed, Sam."

"You have embarrassing pictures of me," Sam argued, to which Dean had responded sharply "When you can take me down with one good arm you can have whatever the hell pictures you want." Hey, it gave Sam a goal in life.

Listening to Dean complain now, Sam had to fight a laugh. He might be a mopey girl, but Dean sure could whine with the best of them when he wanted to. "Need any help with that?" It was snarky, sure, but good-natured enough that Dean didn't glare. He didn't even look up.

"Lemme get back to you on that," he said, shaking out the arm. "God!" he exclaimed.

"It cannot possibly itch _that_ bad."

"You want me to break your arm and we'll find out?" There was a glint in Dean's eyes that told Sam, if provoked, he just might do it.

"I'm good."

"S'what I thought."

The bar wasn't exactly a hopping place. The music wasn't loud, and there wasn't a thumping bass, just something calm and vaguely twangy coming through twin speakers mounted on either side of the bar. There were a few patrons scattered throughout the small space, most of them huddled around the pool table where Dean appeared to have dominated a couple of nights ago.

Dean whacked his arm across Sam's chest. "Check this out."

"What?"

Dean gestured to the bar, where an aproned Laurel Aronson was leaning on the counter while the husky bar tender loaded a few frosty glasses onto a tray she was holding.

_Well, that's convenient. _"She works here?" Sam asked.

"That or she's really thirsty," Dean quipped. "But that's not who I was talking about." He nodded again in the direction of the bar.

Seated there on a stool, hunched over a short line of empty shot glasses and looking very much like an old man, was none other than Officer Nate DeWitt. Before either brother could comment or approach the man, Laurel the cat-loving waitress, popped into their field of vision. "Hey, guys," she greeted warmly. "Are you gonna get a table, or just hang out in the doorway for awhile?"

* * *

"Uh, no," Dean answered, shooting her one of his thousand watt smiles. Sure, she had a few years on him, but she was a woman. An attractive woman, at that. "You sure you've got room for us in here? Place is…bustling."

Laurel smiled and shook her head, waving the guys over to a table close to the bar. "It's a small town. This is a pretty busy night, actually."

"That's…kinda sad," Dean said honestly, and didn't miss his brother's eye roll.

They ordered a couple of beers and sat quietly for a few moments, eyeing Nate with both caution and interest between drinks. The man didn't seem to be aware of anything going on in the bar around him, and maybe not even aware of where he was. Clearly in pain, it was as though the only things registering with him were the drinks in front of him.

Dean took a drink from his beer bottle and let it clunk heavily to the table. He squeezed his eyes shut and blew out a slow breath.

Before Dean reopened his eyes, Sam was _on top _of him, a hand gripping his shoulder and wide eyes in his face. "Dean? You okay?"

Dean brought his fist up to his mouth and let out a low belch.

Sam sank back onto his stool as Dean glanced sideways at him, quirking an eyebrow. "Getting' a little jumpy there, Sammy."

Sam mumbled something under his breath, Dean didn't catch what he was saying, but he saw the flush in his little brother's cheeks. Before he could make a joke, Sam quickly motioned for an approaching Laurel to get to the table just a little bit faster. "What's his story?" he asked in a low whisper, nodding at Nate's back.

Dean shook his head at the lame change of subject, wanting to know what Sam had been so jumpy for. He was always worried in a very big and annoying way, but that had just been downright weird. It wasn't going to be something that would come up anytime soon, because Sam's distraction worked. Laurel glanced over, her eyes sad and downcast, drawing Dean's attention.

It was hard to believe this was the same man. That the hardened, scowling man who had gripped his arm and practically ordered them out of town was the beaten-down, grieving man in front of him, whose shoulders were shaking as he emptied a shot glass in front of him. And then another.

"He gets this way every year, right around this time," Laurel explained, chewing on her lip. "It was Callie's death. He plays the tough guy, but it really did him in."

Dean's ears perked up. "Callie?"

"His daughter."

"She died?"

Laurel nodded, eyes screwed as she thought. "About twenty years ago. She was fifteen, just a kid. Shouldn't have been driving, but she just had to take that car out."

And he started to put things together before he realized he was doing it. "Driving," he echoed hollowly.

"Yeah. Nate got her the car for her fifteenth birthday. Everyone told him he should wait another year, until she had her license, but it was what she wanted, and he said she would be responsible."

"There was an accident," Dean stated flatly, his eyes on Nate DeWitt's trembling shoulders. It was starting to make sense now.

"Pretty bad one, but not her fault." She shook her head in disgust. "Some punk kid, drunk and flyin' high on God knows what all…she never saw it coming. Didn't have the chance."

"Why not?" Sam spoke up.

Dean sighed patiently. College-educated or not, the kid was still prone to be slow on the uptake. "Because he didn't have his headlights on."

Sam's head whipped over, eyes wide. _There's the light bulb, little brother. Welcome to the show._

Laurel frowned. "I thought you didn't know what happened?"

Dean's eyes never met hers as he watched Nate DeWitt stand on shaky legs, knocking back his barstool and one last shot before clumsily pushing his way out of the bar. "Lucky guess."

* * *

"You think she's doing it?"

"Drunk driver, no headlights, highway 50, sudden death? Yeah, I think it's a safe assumption," Dean said, sarcasm pooling onto the sidewalk between them as they walked back to the motel.

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Well."

"Kinda blows your theory outta the water, huh?"

Sam ignored the remark. "What are we gonna do?"

Dean shook his head patiently. His brother was definitely slow sometimes. "We'll do what we do, Sam."

* * *

To be continued...


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

* * *

Sam shook his head and chewed on his right thumbnail. "Damn. It's right here."

"You suck at research."

"Right _here._ Front page article."

"I mean, you suck _real_ bad."

"Callie DeWitt, fifteen, driving home from a friend's house on highway 50 when she was hit head-on by a drunk driver who crossed into her lane…"

"I can practically hear you sucking from all the way over here."

Was Dean _five_ today, or what? Sam was finally annoyed enough to look up from the computer screen and across the room, preparing to shoot something right back. But then as he looked into his brother's somewhat glassy, faraway eyes, he remembered Dean had just unknowingly chased a prescription pain pill with a beer and a half – _you're a fucking GENIUS, Sam _– and his mental processing might not _quite_ be up to par at the moment. Which was probably why he was sitting on the edge of his bed, hands hanging heavily between his knees and looking like he was about to fall over instead of hovering over Sam's shoulder.

A surge of guilt bolted its way through Sam, and he pushed the computer aside. "You wanna call it a night?" he asked, making a show of yawning and stretching his arms out in front of him.

Dean, forever oblivious to how crappy he looked, rolled his eyes. "What's the rest of the article say?"

"Dean – "

"It's ten o'clock. What's the rest of the article say?"

Sam pulled the computer back to his lap, shaking his head. He found his place in the article. "Callie didn't have a chance to get out of the way of the other driver. Just like Laurel said, his headlights weren't on. His name was Kyle Reddy – "

"Where is he now?"

"I thought you wanted to hear this."

Dean leaned back against the headboard of his bed and awkwardly crossed his arms – not looking nearly as cool as he usually did, with the added bulk on his left arm bringing his right shoulder snug up to his ear. He raised his eyebrows to signal he was going to shut up and listen.

_First time for everything. _Sam launched into an explanation about what had happened to the driver, who was just as Laurel had said – a punk. But, he was a lucky punk. The breathalyzer results taken at the scene of the accident had been lost, and with no proof of intoxication, the charge for Callie's death had been brought down to involuntary manslaughter. Kyle Reddy's parents had brought in some hotshot big city defense attorney who managed to, with a plea bargain, get his teenage client a nice supply of community service as opposed to a trial and, most likely, some heavy jail time.

And then one morning about a year after the accident, Kyle's mangled car had been found on the side of, no surprise, highway 50. It appeared he had driven through the guardrail – the same one Laurel Aronson and Sam and Dean themselves would later make friends with – and had died upon impact, a sickening amount of blood coating his head, face, and the steering wheel his body was slumped against.

Most of the town's residents said the kid got what was coming to him, and no one gave the suspicious circumstances a second thought, predictably believing Kyle had been drinking. It didn't seem anyone had ever questioned the sheer magnitude of "drunk-driving" accidents that were to take place over the next twenty years, all on the same stretch of road.

"The road where Callie was killed."

Sam nodded. "How fast were you driving?"

"When?"

Sam glared.

Dean grinned sheepishly. "Right. Um…eighty, eighty-five?"

"Is that a question?"

"Dude, I don't know. It was open highway in the middle of the night. What do you want from me?"

"I'm just trying to figure out why she would have targeted us."

"Was Reddy speeding while he was drunk-driving?"

"Uh…yeah," Sam confirmed, finding the place in the article. "The guy had to have been doing about ninety down the straightaway."

Dean looked impressed. "There you go."

"There I go?"

"It's how she decides who to attack."

Sam laughed incredulously. "She drives her car up and down the road and takes out anyone she finds who's speeding? Shouldn't she have been happy after taking this Reddy kid out? Why keep running people off of the road?"

"That's the thing about angry spirits, Sammy. They're angry, not rational."

He did have a point. Sam glanced back down, his eyes catching something else on the computer screen, and he leaned forward. "Hey, what kind of car did you say it was?"

"What kind of what car?"

Sam ignored the nauseating sentence structure and turned to Dean, glaring once again, but reminding himself HE was the reason for the current speed of Dean's mental faculties.

"Oh. _That _car." Dean squinted, rubbing at the line of stitches on his forehead. "Dart Demon. Old model Dodge," he added.

"Demon?" Sam raised his eyebrows. "We'll ignore the irony in _that_…"

"Yeah, I know. Do you have a point?"

"Guess what kind of car Callie drove?"

Dean nodded, taking in the information. "Where is the car now?"

Sam shrugged. "How many times do I have to tell you, Dean? The computer is _not_ all-knowing."

"Does the computer know where Callie's buried?"

Sam scrolled down on the page. "Bloomfield Cemetery. Only one in the area, just outside of town."

Dean glanced at his watch, and looked up at Sam with a small smile. "You up for a little shake and bake?"

* * *

"Creepy."

Dean cast a sideways glance at his little brother and smirked. "You want me to hold your hand?"

Sam shoved him away roughly, and even as Dean took a few stumbling steps to the right, his side bumping the tall, mossy tombstone he had been walking past, he laughed lightly to himself. His smirk turned into a grimace as he wiped a long length of cobwebs from his jacket sleeve.

"Gross," he muttered to himself, quickly and discretely transferring the webbing to Sam's shoulder as he moved away.

Truth be told, it _was_ creepy. Very creepy. The moon was still pretty full, and big in the sky. Visibility was high, but the entire landscape was swathed with the same eerie white glow that had illuminated the highway a few nights ago, exaggerating existing shadows and creating all new ones. A cool breeze rustled the leaves on the large trees dotting the field, and blew dead ones across the grass in front of them, lending to the scene a very horror movie-esque soundtrack. They were one howling coyote away from being stalked by serial killer…which actually, wasn't too far off.

It had taken them nearly an hour and a half to walk to the cemetery. Sam grumbled and had been a regular little pain in the ass, saying they could take a cab, but Dean knew there were risks with that. They would, as always, do their best to make sure it didn't look as though the grave of young Callie had been disturbed, but there was always the possibility someone would ask questions, and Dean didn't want there to be anyone who could place them at the scene. That meant, sadly, no overweight, smelly cab drivers this night. Just some exercise.

Dean had come to appreciate some of the good things about small towns over the years, and one of those things was the supreme lack of security in all the right places. There had been a gate at the entrance into Bloomfield Cemetery, but a relatively short and rickety one, and even with a cast, it hadn't been difficult to get over. Up, over, and no alarm system or night guard to stunt their search. Now they just had to find Callie's grave.

Twin beams of light scoured the scattered plots. It was an old graveyard, not really a surprise to either of them, and graves weren't marked with flat marble slabs; many of the tombstones were large monuments, some even towering over Sam's head as they passed by. Nearly all were chipped or cracked in multiple places, covered with cobwebs and vines. Dean focused on the ones that appeared less than one hundred year old, and read names aloud as his flashlight traveled over various stones, wincing as he shifted the weight of his duffle over his shoulder. _God_, was he tired and sore.

"We can come back during the day."

Dean threw his head back and sighed. Did Sam ever miss _anything_? "And risk being seen? Good plan. And here I thought you were supposed to be the smart one."

"You find anything?"

"No, not yet. You?"

"No." Now Sam sighed. "I'm going over here." Before Dean could respond, Sam's flashlight beam took an abrupt left, and he disappeared between several large oak trees.

So now he was walking alone in the creepy cemetery. Awesome. But more importantly, _Sam_ was now walking alone in the creepy cemetery. Dean was just about ready to go traipsing after his brother, but then shook his head. Sammy was a big boy now, and they split up all the time. He readjusted his grip on his flashlight and moved in the opposite direction of where Sam had left, letting the light sweep over the row of grave markers on either side of him.

He squinted, trying to make out the engraving on a stone on his right, but the moon had moved behind some heavy cloud cover, taking away his extra light source. Dean had taken a few steps towards the tombstone when he heard a twig snap directly behind him and a hand grip his shoulder, and he uncharacteristically spooked. It _was_ a creepy-ass graveyard, after all.

Heart rate picking up, Dean whirled, duffle sliding to the ground, ready to swing his light and take the head off of whatever was planning on attacking him. He found himself instead looking wide-eyed into the face of his little brother, who, as it would appear, was trying damn hard not to laugh.

_Smooth. _As Dean took a step back and tried to pick the shattered pieces of his dignity and manhood up off of the ground, Sam's smile disappeared, and he cleared his throat. "Do you want me to hold your hand?" he deadpanned.

Dean shot Sam his Look of Death and smacked his hand away.

"I mean, if you're scared…"

"Just keep talking," Dean gritted out, bending to pick his discarded bag up off of the ground.

Sam had himself one last chuckle and punched Dean lightly on the arm. "Come on. I found it."

Callie DeWitt's grave rested on the outskirts of the cemetery, where a group of newer plots were bunched around a much, much older one – the stone marker stood impressively tall, well over eight feet, shaped like a large cross. Large chunks of stone had broken off all around the square base, and the stone was barely visible behind the amount of plant growth covering it.

"Damn," Dean uttered, gazing up at the top of the structure. It looked even larger with the newly reemerged moon lighting it from behind. He dropped his bag to the ground and turned his focus to the grave Sam had mentioned.

It was evident Callie's grave was one very frequently visited; there were numerous clusters of colorful fresh flowers around the marker, and even a few small stuffed animals resting at the base of the stone. Dean found himself frustrated. Someone was going to be visiting Callie soon, most likely before the car was fixed and they were well on their way out of town. And besides, there was something that felt so _wrong_ about disturbing the grave of a girl who had been so loved.

Sam must have been feeling the same way. "There's no other way to take care of this?" he asked uneasily.

Dean straightened, putting on his game face. "She's killing people, Sam."

"Yeah."

They went to work. Dean dropped into a crouch and opened his bag, sliding out a pair of shovels. He stood, tossing one to Sam, who was moving the flowers and stuffed animals out of the way.

Dean snorted. "Girl."

"Shut up." Sam frowned. "How are you planning on digging?"

Dean glanced down at his left arm, useless in this instance, and shrugged. "I'll figure it out."

But this time, he didn't figure it out. There was just no way he was going to be of _any_ help to Sam, and it took less than ten minutes for Dean to come to that conclusion. He was making no progress at all with only his right hand. He tried hefting the shovel above his head and throwing it at the ground, which stuck the tool in the dirt, sure, but then he couldn't muster up enough one-handed strength to pull both the shovel and a load of dirt out of the ground.

He tried this a couple of times, sticking the shovel completely vertical in the ground and placing his right foot on its butt, wrapping his right arm around the handle and pulling back with as much force as he could. The first time, he fell right on his ass. The second time, he managed to pull up about a handful of earth…before falling right on his ass. By the third pathetic attempt, and the third time his rear-end smacked the hard-packed dirt, Sam was laughing so hard he had given up trying to dig, himself, and was leaning on the handle of his shovel, enjoying the show.

Dean pulled himself up with a grumble, cursing his brother under his breath, and chucked the shovel away. And so now he sat, next to where they had tossed their jackets, legs dangling in the hole Sam was working at, mercilessly teasing his brother. It wasn't like he had anything else to do.

"You dig like a girl."

"That's original."

"Well, it's taking you so long to dig that hole I'm out of insults."

A shovelful of dirt suddenly flew up out of the hole right in front of him, and Dean ducked to the left, dirt raining down on him. "The hell, Sam?"

Sam looked up with an innocent smile. "Slipped."

A few minutes later, the business end of Sam's shovel finally clunked against the lid of the coffin they were digging for, and he looked up at Dean, who was already pulling his duffle over, grabbing the can of salt.

Sam stuck the tip of the shovel into the edge of the coffin, and pried it open. Not an easy task, and Sam grunted with the effort. The lid finally opened with a creak and a pop, and Sam fell forward, clumsily catching himself on the edge of the coffin before he fell into it.

Dean snickered, tossing the salt can down to Sam. His brother caught it and popped the top, glaring up at him. As Sam went through the motions of salting the remains in the coffin, Dean pulled a can of lighter fluid from the duffle bag and patted the pockets of his discarded jacket until his pulled out his lighter.

Sam finished the salting process and threw the can up over the edge of the hole. He braced his arms on the ground and hauled himself out as Dean stepped up with the lighter fluid.

"Alright, Callie," he said, "fun's over."

Apparently, Callie wasn't feeling up to visitors at the moment; he hadn't splashed a single drop into Callie's grave before he found himself thrown backwards, can slipping from his fingers. Backwards, right into the monumental-sized tombstone he had been gawking at earlier.

His back slammed hard into an edge of the base of the large cross, the rough stone digging painfully right up into his spinal cord. He fell on his side, propped up on his right elbow. _That _was going to hurt in the morning. "Son of a _bitch_," he spat. It was always his favorite substitute for a more wussy response, like "ow."

"_Ow_."

_Case in point, _Dean thought, turning to where Sam's voice had come from. "Sammy?"

"Yeah, I'm good," he grunted out. Sam had hit a tree. Callie had good aim.

Dean groaned, dragging himself to his knees. "This bitch is _really_ starting to_ piss_ me off."

There was a sudden blast, and then the stone above and behind his head exploded, raining chunks of rock and bits of plant down on him as he ducked back down to the ground. He threw his hands protectively over his head, but a sizeable piece managed to clip him and he hissed, his right hand going instinctively to the spot.

"Dean!"

He heard Sam yell, and opened his eyes to see a sideways and blurry Sam standing and running over to him, then stopping suddenly, hands raised.

There was an audible click, the not-so-subtle sound of another round being loaded into a shotgun, and Dean raised his head quickly, squinting.

Standing not ten feet away, eerily silhouetted by the light of the near-full moon, was a gun-toting Nate DeWitt.

"Just what in the HELL do you two think you're doing?"

* * *

To be continued...


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

* * *

Sam kept his hands raised waist-level, not saying a word, not moving an inch, just praying to whatever God there might be for Dean to just KEEP his mouth SHUT. Because the last thing either of them needed right then was a bullet.

Nate DeWitt was like a rock. An obviously intoxicated rock, but a rock nonetheless. Eerily silent since his initial outburst, eyes glassy red but narrowed and strangely calm, staring unblinkingly. His elbows and shoulders stayed locked and his aim never faltered as the barrel of the gun pointed first at Sam, and then at his brother.

Sam had to give Dean some credit – even with the gun facing him, he was being good. He squinted but didn't say anything, just leaned silently against the base of the stone marker he had been flung against, his right hand still pressed to the back of his head. He pulled the hand away and glanced at it with an 'it figures' kind of shake of the head; even from where he stood Sam could see something wet glistening on Dean's fingertips. He took a cautious step forward, raising his hands ever higher, making it as clear as he could that he was unarmed and had no attack planned.

The shotgun's barrel whipped back to Sam as soon as his foot lifted off of the ground, and he paused again. "I just want to check on my brother," he said.

"I'm _fine_, Sam," came Dean's annoyed response.

This seemed to drag DeWitt out of his rage-induced silence. "See. He's _fine_, Sam," he spat. His calmness faded, and dark eyes whipped wildly between them. "Now, WHAT are you two doing here at my little girl's grave?"

_Think of a reason, Sam. Think of an excuse. Think of ANYTHING…_But there was nothing. He was drawing the biggest blank of his LIFE, and it was coming at the worst possible time. _Dean. _His eyes shot over to his brother. Dean would think of something, Dean _always_ thought of something. But Dean had been banged up, knocked around, partially drugged – _GENIUS_, _Sam_ – and thrown into one too many things, and at the moment he only sat there, legs splayed, with a dumb, blank look on his face.

So it was up to him. Great. _Well, if you can't think of an excuse… _He took a breath. "You're not going to believe us – "

"Try me," Nate gritted out, raising the gun.

"Hey," Dean barked sharply, bringing the focus of the gun and its owner back over to him. "If you wanna talk, we'll talk. But we're not gonna do it with a gun in our faces."

There was a bit of a stare-down, no _way _Dean was backing down, and after a moment Nate nodded and lowered the gun but kept it in hand, nose in the ground.

"That's better," Dean said, with a cocky raise of the eyebrows that made Sam grimace, but DeWitt didn't do anything more than glare at Dean as he dragged himself stiffly to his feet with a wince.

"What are you DOING here?" DeWitt asked harshly for the third time, and it was crystal clear to Sam there wasn't going to be a forth time. The man was only growing angrier, not calming down, exaggerating different words each time.

"We're salting and burning her bones."

Sam's head whipped over to Dean so fast he was sure that he pulled something, or at least gave himself whiplash, and it felt as though his eyes were literally bulging out of their sockets. THIS was exactly _why_ he didn't want Dean saying anything.

DeWitt's right eye and trigger finger visibly twitched. "_What?_"

Sam smiled uneasily, feeling the need to raise his hands again, part calming gesture, part please-don't-shoot-me-because-my-brother-is-a-friggin'-MORON. "See, this is the part where you're not going to believe us – "

"Are you two SICK?" DeWitt had stepped up to the edge of Callie's grave, his eyes flickering over the hole they had dug, the open coffin, the salt and lighter fluid on the ground – arguing a pleasant midnight stroll through the cemetery was certainly out. He didn't seem so drunk anymore, and Sam was really getting worried again about that shotgun the man was still holding, pulling up dirt and grass as it dragged alongside of him. "What IS this?"

"I told you," Dean said. His eyes had closed, and he was using the stone statue behind him as a brace. He looked beat, like he just didn't have the time or the energy for this, his hand still clamped to the oozing cut on the back of his head. "We're salting and burning her bones."

Sam stepped forward, slowly making his way to his brother's side. He knew he was taking a big chance, but if Dean was all in, then so was he. "Your daughter's spirit is responsible for all of the accidents on highway 50."

"No," DeWitt said, blinking and taken aback both figuratively and literally. He stepped back away from the brothers and looked them over like they were crazy. "_Stupidity _is responsible for those accidents. If none of those people had been drinking – "

"THAT many people?" Dean cut in sharply, never one to like being challenged. Sam wasn't surprised by the outburst itself, only that it hadn't come sooner. Dean's hand came away from his head as he made wide, angry gestures. "Are you just in COMPLETE denial?"

"Dean…" Sam was now close enough to Dean that DeWitt didn't hear the hushed warning, though, as it would seem, neither did Dean.

"Your daughter was killed on _that_ road, in that SPOT, and for the past twenty years, how many people have been run off the road?" Dean stared at DeWitt, who had once again fallen silent. "I bet it gets worse this time of year, around the anniversary, right? You _never_ put it together?"

DeWitt still didn't say anything. He didn't so much as blink, eyes boring into Dean like he could stare it all out of him, and make the words not true.

Dean was only encouraged by the man's silence. "Do you know what car it was that ran my brother and me off the road? A Dart Demon."

A sharp intake of breath, which both brothers caught immediately. Sam's eyes bounced between the two men in front of him, and he knew he wasn't needed for the assist. Dean had this one wrapped up with a big red bow on top.

"That was her car, right?" Dean cocked his head. "Pretty rare, but you know that. How many do you think are around here – "

"Things like that don't really _happen_," DeWitt interrupted, the words coming out thick and heavy like he was fighting them. Fighting the words, and fighting tears; the anger was fading but the denial was growing. "And they sure as hell don't happen to my baby girl."

Dean made a frustrated sound, and bent to collect their things. "Come on, Sam. We'll finish this later."

"You certainly will NOT." And there was the sound of the gun being hauled up. This whole night was just not going to plan. There had been no guns in the plan. For the third time in five minutes, Sam's hands started to rise.

Dean whirled around and advanced on the man as though the gun wasn't there. "I'm not going to let more people die, Mr. DeWitt."

"You're insane. You're both…insane." It was quiet, and Sam had heard it enough in the past. This man wasn't an idiot – he _knew_ something was wrong, no matter how many times he denied it, or how mad he was, or how many times he pointed that gun at them. He _knew._

Dean hefted the duffle bag and nodded at Sam. "Him, maybe." He sighed, and it was evident he was just too tired to play the bullshit game. "Believe us or don't believe us, but we're finishing this tomorrow." He gestured to the shotgun clenched in DeWitt's white hand. "You can try and stop us, and you can bring that if you want, but just so you know – I know it's coming, and no gun's gonna stop me."

Sam rubbed at his eyebrow, offering DeWitt a small smile, as if it could somehow counteract Dean's frigid tone and veiled threat. The smile was met with an equally icy glare, and Sam swallowed as he moved past the man, who didn't say a word, just stared down into the open grave that they left behind.

Dean didn't say anything to Sam, just flung the bag into his little brother's hands, uttering one more "Son of a bitch" as he felt the back of his head.

They weren't twenty feet away when Sam heard the gun _thunk_ to the hard ground.

* * *

Sam's hand had to be smacked away three different times between the graveyard and the motel. It was insanely late – or early, depending on how you looked at it – by the time they made it back into town, and, though he would never had said it out loud, all Dean wanted was to crash on that small, lumpy, questionable bed waiting for him.

The cut on the back of his head – the cut that had been drawing Sam's unwanted attention for the past _two hours _– had long since stopped bleeding, but the residual pounding in the whole of his skull hadn't. Dean's hand went again to the spot, as if continuously probing the gash would stop the pounding. He'd had his hand back there enough to get a sense of what it looked like – not deep, though it had bled enough to coat the back of his neck to the point it was sticky, itchy, and driving him completely nuts, and not wide. And _certainly_ nothing worth Sam pulling his hand away _again_ and trying to get a look himself.

Dean wrenched his arm out of his brother's hand. "It's FINE, Sam."

"So you've said."

His hand got closer to his head, and Dean turned enough to whack it away. "Then why won't you believe me?"

"Because you keep messing with it."

"It's itchy," he said, wincing as soon as he said it, partly because he was whining like a little girl and partly because Sam started to grin.

"Theme of the week, huh?"

"Shut up." _Thanks for bringing it up, Sammy, _Dean thought with an inner snarl. Because now that he was thinking about it, his arm was starting to itch again. He clenched his right hand into a fist, fighting the urge to scratch. After a moment, he was wriggling his arm uncomfortably from the shoulder down to his hand, like he could shake it out. After three minutes, Sam was once again laughing at his discomfort.

"I hate you," Dean growled as they drew nearer to the motel.

* * *

The daytime hours passed by rather uneventfully. They slept like college freshman the morning after one too many beers for the first time. While it wasn't at all out of the ordinary for Dean to sleep past eleven when given the opportunity, but it was a completely uncharacteristic move for Sam.

He blindly felt around on the side table until his fingers found his watch, and he was a bit taken aback when he saw the time. He glanced over across the room at his brother, sprawled, snoring, and not looking like he was getting up any time in the near future. Sam frowned as his thoughts went immediately to the cut and bump on the back of Dean's head, and subsequently to his own bruised and sore back and shoulders, but he pushed it away. He had gotten all of a thirty-second look at the spot before they had gone to bed, enough time to wince in sympathy and attempt to help by holding a towel to it, and enough time for Dean to rip it out of his hands and make a few home-nurse cracks. Dean's protesting assessment seemed accurate enough – he was fine, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to wake up with a headache.

And sure enough, forty minutes later, after Sam had showered and shaved and brewed a pot of "coffee" from a crinkly plastic package, Dean pulled himself up in bed with a groan, putting his good hand to his head as he sat up slowly.

Sam looked up from the small table across the room, where he had been playing, and winning, solitaire on his laptop. "Does your head hurt?"

"No, Sam. I got hit by a rock last night, but it feels fucking great this morning." Dean glared up at him, bedhead spikes of hair half-shooting out in every direction and half-matted to his forehead. "Seriously, how did you make it through college?"

Sam rolled his eyes and stood, moving to the dresser. Dean the morning after a knock on the head was not one of the more pleasant Deans to deal with, but Sam didn't take it to heart. He took a plastic cup from the ever present coffee tray and dipped it into the ice bucket he had filled earlier, topping the cup off with half-melted cubes. He walked across the small room and wordlessly placed the cup into Dean's good hand.

"Thanks," Dean mumbled, and held the cup to the back of his head.

The highlight of the very boring day had come mid-afternoon when Dean called Bernie the mechanic to get a rough estimate on 1) the monetary damage he was looking at, and 2) when his baby was going to be road-worthy. He groped around in every pocket of every article of clothing he had worn over the past two days before coming up with the greasy man's business card. Then came the fun part.

It turned out that Bernie wasn't a workin' seven days a week kind of guy, though they probably should have been able to tell that just by looking at him…no, it seemed he liked to take the weekends off. Granted, it was a privately owned and operated establishment, so he had every right to work when he wanted and to not work when he didn't. There was no explaining this to Dean, though, when he called the garage and was greeted by a gruff message stating that Bernie's garage was closed on weekends, for "personal reasons."

As he held the phone, Dean had started shaking his head, lips pursed, total 'why do people keep _fucking_ with me' face on, and though he obviously could not hear what Dean was hearing, Sam had known immediately the line was not being picked up on the other end. He sat quietly on his bed, pretending to be doing something on his laptop – solitaire had gotten old about two hours earlier, and plus, he had started losing. His lips pulled tightly over the grin he was fighting as Dean paced the room, not so calmly informing Bernie he was not a happy customer.

"Hey there, Bernie," Dean gritted out with fake smiles and pleasantries in his voice. "You might remember me from a few days ago…we had a nice little chat, and you've got my Chevy there in your garage. Unattended, by the sound of things…"

Sam ducked his head, coughing into his right fist to cover the short barking laugh that had let itself out, from the utter contempt in Dean's voice – his brother cared _way_ too much about the car. He pretended to not be listening, even tapping a few random keys on his computer for effect.

"I was just thinking about how you told me that my ba…car, that it might be running by Monday. And well, Bernie, I'm having a little trouble with the fact that…son of a bitch."

Sam looked over and saw Dean had stopped in the middle of the room and was pulling the cell away from his ear, muttering to himself and scowling fiercely. He punched viciously at a few buttons on the phone.

He glanced up, possibly finally sensing that he was being watched by one very amused little brother. "Machine cut me off."

Sam bobbed his head. "Sure."

"Bernie, yeah, it's me again. Must be something wrong with your machine there, buddy." Dean resumed pacing the length of the motel room, stalking the whole of the fifteen feet with exaggerated stomps. "Listen, I was told my car was going to be ready on Monday, and it's Saturday, Bernie. And you're closed. Which tells me one of two things is going on." Dean reached the door and spun; the raised eyebrows and look on his face easily recognizable to Sam as the look he wore when he was about to be...well, be DEAN.

"One," Dean held up his left index finger, poking out of the top of his cast, for the benefit of his own satisfaction, because Sam was pretty sure that Bernie wasn't in the room and couldn't see the theatrics Dean was putting on. "She's done and ready and you're drawing it out to rip me off. Or two," there went another finger, "you're completely ignoring her, and if that's the case, I'm inclined to remind you I am completely willing to rip YOU…mother fucker."

Sam grinned. "I don't think it's the machine, dude."

Dean jabbed a finger at him. "You shut up."

"It's just a car, it's not a person."

"You wanna go?"

There was significant evidence to suggest that Sam could not take even a one-armed Dean. "No."

"Then shut up. Goddamn hick." Dean flipped his cell phone shut and flung it down onto his bed.

"Don't take it out on the phone, Dean," Sam said, his face all seriousness. "It didn't do anything to you."

"I thought we decided on the shutting up thing." Dean shot Sam his 'I don't care if you're bigger than me I'll take you out' glare and continued to pace the room, mumbling furiously under his breath. "'Personal reasons,' my ass. You know what he's doing, Sammy? Fishing. Watching NASCAR. Cow tipping."

"He's not cow tipping."

"What he's NOT doing is not fixing my _car_." Dean made one more frustrated back and forth of the room, launching a kick at the dresser holding the television and then turned to Sam. "What kind of locks you think a shithole like that has, huh?" He moved to the corner of the room, where they had heaped a few things they had taken from the trunk of the Impala. He started to rifle through the pile, throwing things carelessly out of his way.

"What are you doing, Dean?"

"I'm gonna break in and fix my own damn car, that's what I'm doing."

Sam pushed the computer aside. He wasn't actually doing anything anyway. "Will you let it go? It's going to get fixed. The parts to that car don't grow on trees."

Dean straightened, clutching an assortment of lock-picking tools, and snorted. "Like you know _anything_ about the parts to 'that car.'"

Sam knew from years of experience there was nothing more he could offer to this particular conversation Dean wouldn't throw right back in his face with some kind of insinuation he was a dumbass, so he did what he always did in these situations, and changed the subject. "So what's the plan for tonight?"

Dean lifted the tools in his right hand with a meaningful look.

"Dean…"

"Yeah, yeah." He tossed the tools back into the mound in the corner. "I gotta have a plan?" he asked, moving to sit on his bed.

Sam rolled his eyes. "It would help, yeah."

"Why don't you come up with the plan?"

"Uh uh," Sam said, shaking his head. "You're the one who was all 'No gun's gonna stop big bad Dean Winchester'…you figure it out."

"Such a drama queen," Dean sighed under his breath. He was silent for a moment, thinking. "Well, if we're going to try the salt and burn again, we're gonna need to find a way to make sure she doesn't come by and decide it'd be fun to throw us around like those friggin' stuffed animals you were so worried about."

"Agreed." Sam nodded and absently rubbed at his left shoulder, still sore from smacking against that tree the night before. "Plan?"

Another silent moment, and Sam was once again reminded why it was just as bad when Dean was thinking as when he was speaking. "We divide and conquer."

Not an option. A statement. The mighty Dean had spoken, and Sam knew without a doubt which half of this battle plan he was going to be relegated to. "Talk me through it," he said, rubbing his forehead and eying Dean carefully.

"We'll double-team her. You handle the bones, and I'll – "

"Distract her?" Sam interjected. He snorted. "Great plan, because you definitely DON'T already look like you've been backed over by a cement truck."

"She can't be in two places at once," Dean argued firmly, ignoring the comment.

Sam shook his head. "I don't like it."

"Tough shit, Sam. You told me to come up with a plan. This is the plan."

Sam was silent for a moment. He _knew _Dean was right – the only sure way to make sure Callie's remains were sufficiently roasted and toasted without interference was for one of them to keep her busy and away from the cemetery – but that didn't mean he liked it. "What if it doesn't work?"

Dean shrugged and quirked a grin, and Sam knew what he was going to say before he even opened his mouth.

"I'll figure it out."

* * *

To be continued...


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

* * *

It was almost like they were a typical American family; the TV was on and had been for roughly four hours. Ever since Sam'd had to talk Dean out of breaking into the body shop, and since Dean had come up with his plan – which hadn't seemed to him to be all that moronic, but Sam had sure had a field day with it. Dean told him that he would "figure it out", but he hadn't really figured out much of anything. Except that with all four available pillows in the room very strategically placed, the forty bucks-a-night motel bed was _almost_ comfortable. Also, Sam wasn't getting his pillows back.

They hadn't really moved, not even to go out for food, which was unspoken and un-admitted-to proof they were both achy and sore from being tossed around like rag dolls the night before. Even after a beating, it really wasn't like the two of them to be so lazy. But a day in the life of a couch potato was suiting Dean just fine for the time being. It _was_ only seven o' clock. And they didn't really have anything to do or anywhere to be until later that night, and if he was really honest with himself, he had no intention of pulling himself up off of that bed unless the building was on fire or he really had to take a piss. He had felt pretty good the day before, but today, he was sore and aching in his back and shoulders and his arm was _killing_ him. Equal parts stabbing pain and irritating itch, and he was once again contemplating amputation, and the variety of knives that were so readily at his disposal. Sam would never let him get away with it, though. _Fucking Sam. _

So he sat, and he scratched. And when Sam glared, he glared right back and reminded him of the offer to break _his_ arm for comparison's sake. And when Sam made mention of the prescription they still hadn't gotten filled, he forced himself to cross his arms and NOT wriggle in his seat, and give an exasperated "Don't need 'em. Itch isn't the same as pain, genius." Both times, Sam got a funny look, but at least shut up for awhile.

While Dean entertained himself with fuzzy local programming and syndicated comedies, digging and ripping his nails into his arm whenever his home nurse wasn't looking, Sam didn't do much of anything, just stayed at the table doing God only knew what on the computer. Dean only hoped he was doing something worthwhile, like looking for porn. The kid was playing a _lot _of solitaire these days.

And so the evening continued on just as the afternoon had – long and boring and quiet and itchy. Not that Dean didn't enjoy himself. He had taken a short break in between episodes of 'Judge Judy' to call Bernie's garage one more time.

_"Bernie, hey. Listen. I MIGHTA been a little harsh earlier. But really, man, come on. Are you there? I won't be mad. Bernie. Bernie, dude, pick up the phone. I just wanna know how my girl's doing. Son of a…you there, Bernie? Eating a sandwich? Not washing your hands and getting all kinds of shit on the leather? If you TOUCH that leather-"_

And that's when Sam had stopped sniggering and jerked the phone out of Dean's hand, ending the call with a pissy "What the hell's the matter with you? You wanna get the car back in one piece or not?"

And Sam put on his bitchface and called to leave his own message. Something about "sorry", and "anger management", and "supposed to be taking medication for that," and Dean had almost had to clock him. Had his hand up and everything – the plastered left, so that it would _really _smart – and then Sam added a hushed and rushed "But seriously, man. I'd hurry up with the car if I were you." And that had made it a little better.

Sam had handed the phone back to Dean and retreated to his little safe area, keeping his eyes glued on the bright screen of his laptop. It felt to Dean like Sam was keeping his distance; like he had something he _really_ wanted to say, but wanted to be well out of smacking reach when he said it. It seemed every other minute he would sigh or make some other noise of the annoyed or bored slow, breathy sigh, every bitchy eh-eh clearing of his throat, every whooshy exhale, had Dean rolling his eyes until his head hurt.

"What?" he finally demanded, not taking his eyes off of the TV screen.

"Hm?" Sam had the nerve to sound innocent and confused as to the cause of Dean's current tone. "Nothing. Interesting article."

Dean rolled his head to the right and glared with all of his earthly power. Sam kept his face blank, that wide-eyed, pinched face Sam _always_ pulled but never accomplished anything but pissing Dean off. It didn't take any longer than ten seconds of The Face for Dean to become sufficiently pissed. His eyes ticked to the ceiling, to the old fan hanging over his brother's head, and he started to calculate his chances of the appliance breaking free of it's screw-y restraints and wiping that Face right off his brother's, well, face.

A moment passed, and _Whoosh, _went another exaggerated rush of air from Sam's mouth. And the ceiling fan, regretfully, stayed firmly attached.

"What the hell, Sam? If you've got something to say, say it. Cut the pissy fifteen-year-old girl crap."

Sam's fingertips tapped on the faux wooden tabletop for a few otherwise silent seconds. "I think I found a flaw in your brilliant plan," he said finally.

"This is me, surprised," Dean said flatly. He straightened slightly from his reclining position on the bed. "'Bout time."

He wished he still had his watch to punctuate this sarcasm with a dramatic glance at it. Of _course_ Sam had found a flaw in Dean's plan…it was what Sam did. Dean had been waiting for Round Two of Sammy Argues Absolutely Everything since he'd made that call to Bernie. Through two entire episodes of 'Blind Date'…thinking to himself if he was on a date with some of those chicks, he'd want to be blind, too, and then trying really hard not to laugh out loud at his own joke…because that's just_ sad_.

Sam went on the defensive immediately, raising his hands and thumping against the back of his chair. He was so touchy sometimes. "Look, all I'm saying is, unless you can _run_ at speeds in excess of eighty miles an hour, which I think is a stretch even for you…how are you even going to get her attention, Dean?"

Dean looked at his brother blankly for a moment, just for fun.

"The _car_, Dean."

Dean grinned. "Oh. Yeah. The car."

Sam literally and to the great enjoyment of his older brother smacked himself in the forehead and started to shake his head, propped up on his elbow, muttering to himself. It was just too easy sometimes. Dean looked back to the TV, sneaking a scratch at his arm, while Sam sighed and stood, moving across the room to where his wallet lay next to the set.

"Hey," Dean protested as Sam's lanky frame blocked the screen. He frowned as Sam shoved his wallet in his back pocket and grabbed his jacket from where it had been slung over the back of the chair. "Where are you going?"

Sam jerked the jacket on. "We've been in this room all day. I need some air, and I need some food." He gestured to the alarm clock on the small table between the beds. "It's about dinnertime, in case you hadn't noticed."

He'd noticed. He just hadn't mustered up enough energy to care. Or move. Dean shook his head. "I think we should just stick around here until dark. We're pissin' people off left and right in this town."

"No, _you're _pissing people off left and right in this town."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Whatever, Sam. I'm serious."

"And _I'm _hungry."

What was he, six? Dean gave his patented-since-he-was-nine _Goddammit, Sammy_ sigh and heaved his weight to the left, rolling over to side of the bed not facing his brother. Lying on his stomach, he rummaged through his bag with his right hand until he heard and felt the crinkly packaging he was searching for, grabbed at it and swung around, practically flinging the snack size bag of Doritos at his brother's head.

Sam caught the bag and glared. "I'm not five, Dean."

"Then stop acting like it." He turned his eyes back once again to the TV, settling as comfortably as he could against the flat pillows, gritting his teeth against the flare-up in the muscles in his back. _Fucking Sam. _Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sam continue to stand by the door, holding the bag of chips and glaring his way. Dean could feel the glare more than see it, but it didn't matter, because he knew he had won. He always won. Perk of being the oldest.

Sure enough, after about a minute, Sam dropped the chips and his jacket to his bed, grumbling under his breath. Sam had had his grumpy switch hit, and he stalked across the room and hefted his duffle from the crap heap in the corner, tossing it onto his bed. _Aww._ Poor, abused wittle Sammy.

Sam went into complete woman-mode and started pulling things out of his bag none-too-gently by the fistful and heaping them into piles on top of the bedspread, muttering and mumbling to himself. The unpack/repack. Dean shot a few glances his way, but ignored him for the most part, letting him work through all of that emo punk rock angsty rage he seemed to have built up. He flipped through the eleven channels the cable-less television provided, his ears suddenly perking to one very distinct and slightly louder "Shit" coming from across the room.

Sam, having grabbed just a hair of a handful too much from his overstuffed bag, was fumbling, arms a-flailing with two t-shirt-filled hands, to catch a small object before it hit the ground. He did not succeed.

Dean slowly sat up, remote still in hand, and watched the small pill bottle bounce off of the bed, clatter to the floor, and roll to a slow stop against a leg of the dresser. Sam's arms and legs were longer, but he was still not as quick as a sore Dean, who was up and off the bed in a flash and on the bottle before Sam could take more than one step.

Prescription pain killers. Dean inspected the label and repeatedly swatted Sam's hands away as he tried to grab the bottle from him, his cast finally connecting solidly with his little brother's forearm.

Sam stepped back, eyes wide and not-so-innocent, hands raised like he was expecting another swing. "Dean…"

"You poppin' pills, Sammy?" Dean looked up, not pleased, and Sam swallowed, knowing that shit was going down. The name on the label was the name that had been on the insurance card in the ER, and here in his hand were the very pills prescribed to him Sam had been pestering him to pick up and start taking. The prescription had been filled the day before, probably while they were in the drug store. Sam was a sneaky rat bastard.

Sam's mouth dropped open and he fumbled for a response for about five seconds, and then his face set and he ripped the bottle from Dean's hand. "You never would have gotten them yourself."

"So, what? You were just gonna horde them away until I agreed to take them?"

A funny look came over Sam's face, something righteous and devious and mildly…proud? "You already…" he started but trailed off, smartening and shutting up. And up again went the bitchface. "Yeah, that's…what I was gonna do."

There was a pause. A very still, quiet pause, which caused Dean to cock an eyebrow and rock back a step. Sam was a baaad liar. Always had been. And _this? _It was like he wasn't even trying.

Dean narrowed his eyes suspiciously at his little brother. No wonder he had felt so good the day before. Winchesters were nothing if not masters of sneakiness and subterfuge. "Sam," he started, his tone both a threat and a warning at the same time. "Did you – "

The knock at the door took them both by surprise. Both looked to the door – Sam looking at the door like it was God himself come aknocking to save him – and back at each other.

"You so planned that," Dean muttered, shaking his head. He reached out and jerked the pill bottle from Sam's hand. "This isn't over."

Sam rolled his eyes and, being closest to the door, immediately turned and crossed the distance in a few quick steps to glance out of the peephole. "Huh," he said into a face full of wooden door, and pulled away, his hand moving down towards the knob.

Dean held up his hand, gripping the bottle of painkillers like he could smash it out of existence. "Hold on. Who is it?" He was predictably ignored, and Sam opened the door to reveal a very wrinkled and worn-looking Nate DeWitt on the threshold.

"Mr. DeWitt," Sam said, taking a step back, half-politeness and half-surprise.

DeWitt didn't say anything for a moment. It was raggedly obvious that the man hadn't slept for even a minute the night before. His eyes were heavy-lidded and red – from lack of sleep or crying or possibly both – and his hair was spiky from having fingers run through it, over and over. He was wearing the same blue flannel button-down and jeans that they had seen him in at the cemetery, only more wrinkled.

Dean, defenses instinctively rising, narrowed his eyes and said the first thing that popped into his mind. "How did you find us?"

Sam shot him a look as he closed the door behind the older man, and Dean ticked his mouth in an annoyed response, returning his eyes the officer now in their little impromptu base camp. It wasn't something that happened very often, and Sam could be as polite as he wanted, but it was certainly not something Dean was particularly comfortable with. Especially when the intruder was a man that had held a loaded shotgun inches from his face the night before. Not the best way to make friends.

DeWitt didn't notice the non-verbal exchange that passed between the brothers. He ran a weathered hand over his face with a faraway look. "Only two motels in town, and you boys came across as the cheap type."

Dean could be offended later. He had other things on his mind. "What are you doing here?" He realized he was still squeezing the plastic bottle in his right hand, and tossed it into the junk pile corner of the room. Sam's eyes followed the movement and he opened his mouth but shut it quickly. Dean smirked victoriously. _More important things to worry about, huh, Sam? Sucks for you. _He turned his full attention back to the older man.

The look Nate DeWitt gave him was completely understanding, and very faintly…apologetic. His hand dropped to his side. He looked beaten-down, but like he knew he deserved Dean's harsh tone. Meaning that he _knew. _About his daughter.

"I spent the night and all day at the library," he started, confirming Dean's thoughts.

Still standing behind DeWitt, Sam crossed his arms, a puzzled look on his face. "S'it open all night?"

Dean rolled his eyes.

DeWitt ticked a quick glance over his shoulder. "I have keys."

Sam looked impressed. "That's actually pretty cool."

_Oh, God. _The inner nerd had been unleashed. "What are you doing here?" Dean repeated, steering the conversation firmly _away_ from geek-talk.

Tired, steely blue eyes held his gaze as DeWitt swallowed with difficulty. "I checked dates. The things you mentioned…"

Dean raised his eyebrows, moving to sit on the edge of the bed. "And?" he encouraged, leaning forward to rest his forearms on his thighs.

The man drew himself up. "She was a good kid."

Both Winchesters nodded.

"_Great_ kid. Smarter than…She didn't deserve what happened."

Dean straightened. "And none of those people deserved – "

"I'm not making excuses," DeWitt cut him off, holding up his hand. "I'm just letting you know. This…wasn't Callie. She was…" he trailed off again.

Sam stepped forward and put a hand on the man's arm, total hug-me-I-have-big-sad-puppy-eyes-face on. "Sometimes, things just happen."

The older man looked to Sam and nodded, and when he turned back to Dean, there were the beginnings of tears in his eyes. "You can stop it? You can stop…her?"

Dean propped his right hand on his leg. "Yeah."

"And you're, what, some kind of professionals?"

"Some kind," Dean said with a nod.

Nate DeWitt's head bobbed a few times, like he was trying to keep his head above water. He moved to his left and sank into a chair at the table, running both hands over his face. "And she'll be okay?"

The brothers exchanged a look. Dean took a breath but didn't speak. Sam cocked his head. "She'll still be dead, Mr. DeWitt."

More bobbing. "Yeah. I mean, I didn't think…" The man met Dean's eyes again. "You have to?"

"Yeah. It's the only way to make sure she doesn't hurt anyone else."

"Okay." It was a whisper. "But I want to be there."

Both brothers spoke up simultaneously. "Mr. DeWitt – "

He stood, nearly knocking the wooden chair to the ground. "She's my daughter. And I want to be there."

Dean met Sam's eyes over DeWitt's shoulder, trying to communicate just how much he did not want this man involved.

Sam looked away. "Okay."

"Sam – "

"It's fine, Dean."

Dean sat back. Well, then. As if he didn't have enough reasons to beat the tar outta Sam, the list just kept growing.

And Sam just kept going. "You can meet me at the cemetery at midnight."

DeWitt nodded and stood, moving to the door, to which Sam quickly stepped over and opened for him. "You boys have a, uh, plan, right?"

"Not just yet, but we're working – " Sam started, eyes going anywhere in the room but his brother's face.

Dean stood quickly and gave Sam enough of a glare to make sure he knew just how annoyed he was. "Yeah, of course," he said, cutting Sam off. "We're just having a problem with one minor detail…" A glint from outside the open door caught Dean's eyes and he trailed off, leaning just enough to the left to see past Sam.

He straightened, grinning like it was Christmas. Like the Ford F150 illuminated by the flat glow of the parking lot lighting was a present waiting to be opened. "Officer DeWitt, is that your truck out front?" _Your big, beautiful, heavy-duty, extended cab, hauling stuck-ass semis out from underneath overpasses truck?_

Nate shot a glance over his shoulder, as though he didn't know what truck Dean was talking about. "Yeah."

"It's nice."

Nate DeWitt shifted and eyed the younger man suspiciously. "Yeah, it is…"

Dean's grin widened. He was maybe even happy enough to forgive Sam for agreeing to let the man come along. "Can I borrow it?"

* * *

Sam stood in the middle of the room, arms crossed and face set, while Dean moved about, packing up a bag of necessary supplies for Sam to take back with him to the cemetery, with a little extra, since this was apparently Bring a Civilian to Work Day. Dean would really prefer it if Sam packed his own shit, but his little brother had made no move to do so since Nate DeWitt had left the motel room, deciding instead to spend that hour and a half grilling Dean about every little itty, bitty, tiny insignificant detail about the plan for that night.

"What are you planning to do if she does come after you?"

Okay, so the details were, perhaps, _not_ so insignificant, but Dean didn't want to get into this. Again. He was very capable of taking care of himself, and taking out a ghost while he did it. And besides that, he was still pissed about the whole medication situation. He didn't necessarily want to talk to Sam right now, and he didn't need this mothering bit Sam was pulling. He didn't answer, just wordlessly and awkwardly checked a couple shotguns, making sure they were loaded with rock salt while bracing them under his pretty much useless left arm.

Sam, whose inner mother hen was never completely satisfied, continued. "Are you even driveable?"

Dean cocked an eyebrow but didn't look up. "You making up words now, college boy?"

"Answer the question."

Dean sighed and dropped the gun he was holding onto the bed. He turned and held his hands up for Sam to inspect. "Two hands, Sammy."

Sam raised his eyebrows, nodding pointedly at the cast.

"Two _arms_, then. More than enough." He went back to packing Sam's bag, feeling like a freakin' MOM getting her kid ready for his first day of kindergarten. The thought made Dean pause, and he cocked his head and smiled, thinking about the similarities.

"You really think this is a smart plan?"

He was just NOT. GOING. TO. GIVE. UP.

Dean threw his head back and sighed the longest sigh he was physically capable of. It was a _beyond_ stupid question, and Sam had to know it was. A _smart_ plan? Dean _never_ made plans because they were _smart. _He made plans because they _worked._ Sam more than knew this, and Dean knew that he knew, and so he replied only with a clipped "Sure."

"Don't blow me off, Dean. I'm being serious here."

"It's gonna be fine, Sam."

"Dean – "

"It's gonna be _fine_, Sam."

* * *

The truck ran decently. Wasn't anything close to his baby, but it wasn't a bucket of rust. The engine roared a little, and Dean kind of liked it. He snuck a glance at the clock on the dash. _They should be there by now._ Dean hooked his plaster cast into the steering wheel, bracing it, and groped in his jacket pocket for his cell. He hit the speed dial for Sam's cell and the speakerphone button, holding the phone against the wheel as he returned to steering with his right hand.

The line was picked up before the first ring was through.

"_Dean, where are your HANDS?" _

Sam's question came more in the form of a demand, laced with equal parts panic and concern, and Dean took a moment to properly roll his eyes and shake his head before he responded. "Relax, woman. You're on speakerphone."

_"Oh." _Beat._ "You see anything yet?"_

"No, nothing. Man, I've been going eighty-five up and down this road for the past twenty minutes. Maybe Callie doesn't want to play tonight."

_"Maybe…"_

Sam might have said something else, but Dean didn't hear it. Up ahead, coming around the bend, was a sizeable dark blob. "Sammy, hold on. I got somethin'."

_"Is it her?"_

Dean squinted, and when he made out the shape of the old-model car, he sat back a little. "Yeah, Sam. It's her."

Sam let out a breath. _"You up for this?"_

Dean stiffened as he hit the high beams on the truck. "Just do it." He heard rustling on the other end as Sam started getting his things ready. "Sam."

_"Yeah?"_

"Dig like a man, alright?"

* * *

To be continued...


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

* * *

Sam could swear he could hear every sound in the cemetery. The Winchesters had, pretty embarrassingly, been caught off guard the night before, hadn't been prepared for the ghost's attack. That was not the case now. They were on the offensive and preemptive defensive at the same time. His nerves were already frayed, knowing what Dean was doing, and his senses were peaked; Sam was in full-on hunter mode, and not a damn thing was going to go by unnoticed.

He could hear the wind whistling over and around each tombstone. Could hear the dry swish of every leaf that continued to fight and cling to the autumnal skeletal remains of the tall trees dotting the field. Could hear the rough scrape of every fallen leaf against the stone of a grave marker. Could hear the irregular, rasping breathing of the man next to him as they staked out Callie's grave and waited for the go-ahead from Dean.

Dean, who was out racing up and down the highway, running interference and actually _trying_ to bring Callie's ghost to himself. It was a _stupid_ plan. It was a _reckless_ plan. It was a Dean Winchester plan.

Crouched behind an ivy-covered granite tombstone, Sam had never felt so uncomfortable on a hunt. For one thing, he felt utterly stupid. What kind of ghost were they going to fool by hiding behind tombstones? Callie had died young, yeah, but she hadn't been _four_. And snuggling up closely to that dumbass feeling was the incessant nagging something was going to go wrong. He'd had the feeling since Dean had come up with this plan, and he hadn't been able to shake it, no matter how many times Dean said "It's gonna be fine." In Dean Winchester-speak, "It's gonna be fine" meant nothing more than "Leave me alone" or "I'm only pretending to listen to you in the first place." It was not reassuring, not at all.

And to top it all off…well, how many times had a surviving family member of the spirit they were aiming to destroy accompanied them on a hunt? True, Sam had said it was okay the man tag along, but here now, he was having his fair share of doubts. What if DeWitt was there to _stop_ him? Played the sympathetic father and wormed his way right into the hunt, with Sam's permission. God, Dean would _kill_ him.

Sam let out a tense breath and gazed out at the plot they were staking out. The dirt they had shoveled out the night before had been patted back down in the hole, and the flowers and stuffed animals he had moved had been set back at the base of the stone. "They covered her back up," he observed absently.

"_I_ covered her back up."

Sam turned to the man, who appeared even stiffer and more uncomfortable than he was, and swallowed. Nate DeWitt was still and clearly anxious, leaning forward on the balls of his feet and looking straight ahead. Sam couldn't even imagine what was going through the man's head. "Mr. DeWitt, I'm sorry – "

"Don't, Sam." DeWitt's shoulders tensed and he shifted the rock salt-loaded shotgun to rest against the stone in front of him. Sam had practically had to force the gun onto him, insisting that in his hands, it was for nothing more than protection.

The older man's eyes stared unblinkingly out over his daughter's grave. "I know you want to try and make things better…but I just don't think there's anything you say to me right now that's going to make that happen." His head slowly pivoted. "Do you?"

Sam stared back for a moment, and then gave a slow shake of his head. Nate's head bobbed a few times, and his eyes again went to his daughter's grave.

It was quieter; Sam couldn't hear much of anything anymore except for Nate's breathing. He certainly wasn't feeling any more comfortable with the situation. Another breathy sigh had him surveying the area with squinted eyes. "Come on, Dean," he said under his breath.

Not ten seconds later, his cell phone rang, the sound trilling much too loudly through the silent graveyard. His own gun clunked to the ground as his hand went immediately to his pocket. He had the phone out and up to his ear before it rang twice. "Dean, where are your HANDS?" His bordering-on-frantic tone drew the wide-eyed attention of the man crouching next to him who, instincts kicking in, gripped the gun a little bit tighter.

"_Relax, woman. You're on speakerphone."_

"Oh." Sam paused, feeling like a moron."You see anything yet?"

_"No, nothing. Man, I've been going eighty-five up and down this road for the past twenty minutes. Maybe Callie doesn't want to play tonight."_

"Maybe…" Sam looked over the top of the tombstone and gave the area another quick sweep. Nothing but leafy shadows and white moonlight bouncing off of rough stone edges. "Maybe we should just pack it up, you know? Give it another night – "

"_Sammy, hold on. I got somethin'."_

…_And more time to think of a better plan, _that was what Sam was going to say.

The words died in his mouth, and Sam swallowed them and held his breath, meeting Nate DeWitt's eyes. "Is it her?" The older man stiffened, his hand gripping the shotgun with knuckles so white they were visible even in the dark shadows that were "hiding" them.

"_Yeah, Sam. It's her."_

Sam let out the breath. "You up for this?"

_"Just do it."_

_Way ahead of you, bro. _Sam was already rummaging through the duffel bag at his feet.

_"Sam."_

He paused at the sound of his name, crouching with his hands in the duffle, phone still perched on his shoulder. There was a tic in Dean's voice that he couldn't quite place. "Yeah?"

_"Dig like a man, alright?"_

Sam rolled his eyes. "Be careful," he said seriously. Silence on the other end. "Dean," he started, serious turning to warning.

He didn't get an answer, just a click and a dial tone, and Sam swore, tossing his cell phone to the ground next to the bag. He pulled out the canister of salt and another of lighter fluid and set them aside, patting his jackets pockets to make sure he had matches on him. If not, this would be a pretty pointless trip. Satisfied everything was in order, he reached for the shovel on the ground next to him.

"What exactly is it that you're going to do?" DeWitt asked, eyes widening at the sight of the supplies and Sam collecting them.

Sam paused. What was it the man _thought_ he was going to do? He had been there the night before, had busted in on them standing over the grave with these very items, ready to drop a match into the hole and leave the corpse of his teenage daughter nothing more than a pile of ash. He _knew_ what Sam was here to do, and hell, he had _demanded _to be there, too.

Sam squinted, grasping the handle of his shovel. "Mr. DeWitt, if you're having second thoughts…I mean, I can do this on my own."

DeWitt's eyes narrowed and he sat back on his heels. It was the insinuation he was going to have _anything_ to do with the process of destroying his daughter's spirit; he was there merely as an observer. Maybe to step in and stop Sam if he felt it was going too far. And Sam was almost positive by the man's limits as a father…it was going to go too far.

"No," the man said, quiet but steady.

Sam waited for more, but that was it. They rose in unison, Sam with determination and DeWitt with hesitation, eyes locked, and Sam could only hope to GOD the man didn't try and stop him. Not with Dean out there as bait. But the older man didn't say a word, only stood, holding that gun down at his side so tightly Sam wouldn't have been surprised to see dents in the metal.

Sam pursed his lips and moved forward with the shovel. He'd wasted enough time already.

* * *

The size of the truck he was driving and that residual anger at Sam simmering away in his gut gave Dean enough pissed-off, to hell with the world macho man confidence to lay a little more pressure on the accelerator. He kept his eyes on the shadowy form of the Dodge Dart as it passed by on his left, and his eyes shifted immediately and without blinking to the rearview mirror.

"Son of a bitch," he muttered. The mirrored image showed nothing on the road behind him but reflected moonlight from the blacktop. Dean lifted his foot slightly off of the accelerator; he didn't want to move too quickly from where he had spotted her. His right hand twitched towards his phone, tossed onto the bench seat next to him. He didn't want Sam doing anythingdestructive to Callie's grave until he was DAMN sure that she was nowhere near –

The grinding thunk and crunch of metal on metal cut off Dean's thoughts. But it was more surprise than concern for the well-being of either the vehicle or himself; Callie might have been a smart girl, but not so much a smart ghost. Her little two-door POS had nothing of the beast he was currently driving. The truck jerked forward, but the hit had about as much effect as a shot on a three hundred pound offensive lineman. Dean's fingers didn't slip on the wheel, and his foot remained firmly leaded on the gas pedal. _What now? _He thought smugly.

There was a sudden ram on the left, much like with the attack on the Impala, and _much_ harder than was proportionally possible for the car behind the hit. Dean's overconfident thoughts quickly dissolved to _Hurry up, Sammy_, as the truck was forced into a rusty, stuttered glide against the guard rail on the right side of the road. He winced at the scraping sound; Nate DeWitt was _not_ going to be a happy man when he got his truck back.

Dean got as good a grip on the steering wheel as was possible with one hand and, without slowing down, threw it and his whole body to his left, countering Callie's attack with an offensive strike of his own. The nose of the truck smashed into the right headlight of the Dart, taking it out. Dean was almost surprised when the small car spun out of the way, and legitimately surprised when it faded away into nothing.

"The hell…" His hand once again twitched towards the phone on his right. _Should warn Sam…_

His fingers gripped the plastic casing, rough in spots from being repeatedly dropped or flung around, Dean's pocket not usually being the safest place, just as those damned headlights – _both_ of them, _what the hell_ – flared to brilliant white life once again…directly behind the truck. He was blind to anything but the intensity of the light for no more than a few seconds, but it was enough to keep him from doing any defensive driving.

The force from the hit was like being struck by a frickin' semi. His phone was dislodged from his fingers, and his casted arm was driven from where it had been bracing the steering wheel into the dashboard, fingers connecting solidly with the hard plastic. Hot little flares ignited in Dean's knuckles. He somehow managed to keep his head up, his chest flying into the face of the wheel instead. All of the air in his lungs was pushed out, along with a raspy "Come ON, Sammy."

Dean eyed the Dart in the rearview mirror; she was currently about ten feet behind him and keeping that distance as they sped down the road. Dean knew he had two choices: hang a U and surprise her with an unexpected offensive maneuver, or keep up this action-movie chase scene. He was heading out of town, so he figured that option two would work just fine right now. Keep her as far away from the cemetery as he could.

* * *

Sam plunged the shovel again and again into the loose earth with quick, frantic scoops. It was coming out easier that it had the night before – airy and light from having already been shoveled through twice. He flung the dirt whichever way the shovel wanted to go, not really caring about making a nice, neat pile with which he could refill the hole; he was past caring. All he wanted was to get the hole dug, get the bones burning, and get the hell out of this town.

Nate DeWitt stayed quiet, standing at the top of the hole – which was taking Sam way too long to dig – staring down at him with an annoyingly wide-eyed gawk. Sam refused to meet the man's eyes, refused to give DeWitt the opportunity to try and talk him out of this. Next to the man's feet were the canisters of salt and lighter fluid, and in Sam's pocket was a matchbook. Couldn't leave those on the ground, where a father overcome by second thoughts could take off with them, leaving Sam to start the fire by rubbing two sticks together. This was already taking too damn long.

Throwing a shovelful of dirt over his shoulder, Sam snuck a glance at his watch. Ten minutes. It had only been ten minutes, but _damn_, it had been _ten_ _minutes_ already. Sam looked down his dirt-streaked jeans to the amount of soil still under his feet – _too_ _much_ – and around at what he had already moved. The grassy ground of the graveyard was level with his thighs. _Shit. _

He swallowed, shivering slightly as the beads of sweat rolling down from his hairline and neck turned icy in the chilly wind. He met DeWitt's eyes, hoping to communicate his panic and fear to the man. Sam didn't GET scared…but he didn't think he could do this _fast_ enough. He was breathing hard, and his arms were already aching, ready to snap off at the shoulders and thud onto the dirt at his feet.

The older man took a step back, his head moving repeated left to right. "I can't," he said, his voice low and rusty.

Sam bit his lip, fully aware of the precious time he was wasting just trying to get through to this man the seriousness of the situation. "Your daughter is already dead, Mr. DeWitt," he said steadily. "I don't want my brother to die, too."

He could _hear_ DeWitt swallow, could hear the grass bending under his feet as he took another step back, could hear the thudding of the man's heart – or maybe that was his own. "Nate, please."

DeWitt opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He swallowed again, and resumed shaking his head. "I can't," he repeated, his voice swallowed up by a harsh howl of wind.

Sam dropped his face to his shoulder, vigorously rubbing salty sweat from his forehead and around his eyebrows. _Fuck._ He wouldn't look back up at the man, just turned his back and started digging from the other direction, not really giving a shit if he gave the officer a dirt shower.

* * *

It was like she knew it was him. Knew he had walked away from the first attack in one piece, and knew he had been the one trying to roast and toast her remains the night before. She wasn't letting up, not at all, which was good news for Sammy, but baaad news for him.

Dean had the accelerator to the fucking _floor_, but the hits just kept coming, faster and harder. Full of twenty years of pent-up rage at the world and everyone still living and breathing in it. A startling engine roar and thud at the rear of the truck bed had the large vehicle spinning in a nauseating arc across the road, Dean's stomach landing somewhere out in the woods that were suddenly to his right. The right side tires dug and pulled at the grit and gravel along the side of the road as Dean fought to maintain control of the truck. He righted the F150 on the blacktop and punched the brake pedal, screeching to a stop.

Breath coming hard and heavy, bruised chest fighting each and every one and the fingers of his left hand feeling large and hot, Dean scanned the highway with narrowed eyes. She was gone again, and Dean risked a glance at the clock on the dash. Almost fifteen minutes had passed since he had flashed his high beams at the Dart. Maybe that was enough time. Maybe Sam had finished –

There were no lights behind him to warn him of the next hit, it just _happened. _

He wasn't ready; the Ford truck lurched and skidded forward at least five feet, lurching Dean forward with it. His arms flew out to the sides of the steering wheel, left cast going into the corner where the door's window met the windshield, right hand thunking into the glass of the windshield. And, the icing on the cake, his forehead smacking down onto the hard wheel, right in the spot where he had already been stitched. The stitches gave immediately, warm trickles of blood snaking their way down Dean's face.

It took a moment for it to register in Dean's fuzzy and buzzy head the truck was still moving. His foot had slipped from the brake pedal, and that small – _way_ too small to be causing the damage it was to a truck like that – car was _pushing_ the F150 down the road. Dean sat back, wincing as he gripped the steering wheel with the now-throbbing fingers of his right hand. He stomped back down on the brake pedal, causing the tires to squeal and protest the piss-ass little Dart forcing them along the blacktop.

There was an insane amount of resistance coming from the locked tires of the truck, but the two vehicles continued in a crooked path down the otherwise deserted road for a good thirty feet. The Ford's tires kept screeching, and Dean coughed at the rising stink of burning rubber seeping into the interior of the truck. His hands and control of the truck were shaky, and the F150 started listing and turning a slow forty-five degrees to the left and into the middle of the road as it was pushed along.

The sudden lack of momentum was as unexpected as its sudden presence, and the truck shuddered a bit as all that pressure he was putting on the brakes finally did their job and the truck halted. Dean frowned and raised his eyes, looking around.

The Dart had stopped forcing him forward; the car was idling about five feet away. Dean watched with squinted eyes as the car reversed another shrieking ten feet, repositioning itself, and then with wide eyes as he realized it was no longer the back bumper of the truck lined up with the Dodge's front, but the driver side door.

* * *

_Finally_.

Sam forced the tip of the shovel into the crack between the two halves of the coffin and strained to pry the lid open, just as he had the night before. It flew open, crashing into the wall of dirt and sending up a dirty cloud that caused Nate DeWitt to cough and wave a hand in front of his face.

Sam glanced down and the remains in the coffin and no longer felt that hesitation he had the night before. He wasted no time. "Give me the salt," he said, reaching his hand up to the man.

DeWitt looked down at him, but didn't move.

* * *

Dean heard the engine of the Dart roar, and knew another ram was coming. He pressed down on the accelerator and peeled the truck right the fuck out of Callie's path of destruction, heading back towards town. His left arm was lying in his lap, and blood continuing to run down his face. He blinked furiously to keep it out of his eyes, shooting a glance every other second to the rearview mirror. Not that it would do much good if he couldn't fucking _see_ her coming.

It was just too dark, and he wasn't entirely sure that was all due to the natural darkness of night. His head was throbbing, his eyelids felt heavy, and it was painfully obvious he was driving in a not-so-straight line down the highway. Dean swallowed, flexing two hands' worth of sore fingers. _Should call Sam. Should tell Sam to just get the fuck out of there. _

But his cell phone had been driven out of his hand earlier, and he didn't exactly have the time to go ho-humming and searching for it. Dean drove for another minute or so, and then started to ease off of the gas, just a bit. A few squinted glances in the rear and side mirrors had him finally slowing to a stop.

Dean shot quick glances to his left and right, into each mirror, and over his shoulder, out of the back window, just for good measure. The area looked vaguely familiar, but it was just too wooly in his head for him to really recognize where he was. He sat in the truck, the engine now growling with a stutter, and just listened. To the sweet sound of nothing.

'_Bout goddamn time, Sam. _Dean sighed and leaned his head back against the seat, wiping at the blood on his face, waiting for Sam to call so he could find his damn phone.

The inky black behind his eyelids became suddenly bright orange, like the moon had exploded. It physically hurt, a lancing slice through his eyes and into his brain, and he squeezed his eyes shut tighter, shaking his head. When he was finally able to pry his eyes open, Dean snuck a watery peek at the source of the blinding light.

He was caught so completely off guard all he could do was stare dumbly at the headlights glaring like a white-hot supernova to his right. _But Sam…_he thought, a little confused, the knock on the head catching up to him.

He then heard the roaring of the engine he had been listening for, and Dean didn't even have the time or the speed to get out of the way. As the right side of the cab of the F150 cradled in, Dean was thrown into the window on his left.

And for the third time, a vehicle Dean was driving was ground into that damned guardrail. And not just _into_ the guardrail…

"_I don't think they ever really fixed it right…"_

…_through_ the guardrail.

* * *

"Give me the salt," Sam repeated, face set and fingers wagging expectantly.

DeWitt blinked blankly down at Sam, like he was seeing him for the first time. He sucked in a breath and bent, tossing the desired canister down into the hole. Sam quickly popped the top and sprinkled as little salt as was needed over Callie's remains.

He looked back up. "Lighter fluid."

There was another frustrating and fist-clenching pause before DeWitt tossed _that_ can down to Sam. He doused the interior of the coffin in three seconds flat and hauled himself out of the grave.

He had barely straightened before he found that the ground was no longer under his feet.

Sam hit the rough top of a tombstone right smack in the center of his back, toppling over to land on his stomach with an 'oof' and the wind knocked out of him. His first thought was, _Ow_, his second thought, _Dean_. Because if Callie's spirit was THERE, in the cemetery, something had gone really, really wrong out on the highway.

He swallowed and pushed himself up, bracing his body on his hands and the toes of his boots, and peered around the side of the tombstone. His stinging back was _not_ liking the angle at which he was bending his body, but he kept the position, kept as still as he could, eyes wildly roving over the scene.

Nate DeWitt was standing next to the hole, mouth open and hands clutching the shotgun close to his body. "Callie?" he whispered, and Sam barely caught it in the light rushing of the wind.

But he sure as hell caught the form of the fifteen-year-old girl shimmering into existence in the empty space between where he was crouched on the ground and where Nate DeWitt stood frozen and transfixed by the sight of his very dead daughter.

* * *

To be continued...


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

* * *

"Callie?"

And, yes, there was now a ghost on the scene. And, yes, Nate DeWitt seemed to have been rendered nearly catatonic, with the exception of his daughter's name slipping from his lips every few seconds. And, yes, Sam's back was throbbing like a mother. But those things were being pretty well glazed over at the moment, because Sam couldn't get past the fact that something was wrong with Dean. That something HAD to be wrong with Dean.

_Focus_. He _had_ to, because before he could find and help his brother, he had to take care of…this. Sam couldn't remember the last time he had been so damn tense, and he didn't even know where to fucking start. Every muscle in his body was tight and his mind was racing and he was about fifteen seconds away from grinding his teeth into nothing. The whole outing had already gone SO wrong, and with Callie's ghost unexpectedly dropping by, there were even more possibilities for things to get even more screwed.

It was as though Nate had forgotten why they were there and that Sam even existed. He just gaped at the sight of his daughter, and kept repeating her name. The blonde spirit had yet to acknowledge him, but if he was frustrated it didn't show; his tone never changed from the quiet, flat whisper. He took a small step towards her and halted. To Sam, his wide eyes betrayed a fear that he would he startle her and she would run away. But she didn't move, just stared back at him and looked…well, dead. Her attention was solely on her father; she hadn't cast a single glance in Sam's direction since he'd landed face-down.

It certainly didn't _look_ like anything was going to happen. There was just a lot of standing and staring going on and Sam was not one to leave a job unfinished, but a tiny voice in the back of his mind just kept repeating, _Leave him and get to Dean. _Because there was just no getting around it, Sam was scared. Scared and feeling very guilty, because he _knew_ he had been taking too long. If anything had happened to Dean, it was his fault. His fault for letting DeWitt come along, and his fault for allowing the older man to hold him up and make it just take too damn long.

But he couldn't just _leave_. Callie was putting up a pretty good front, playing the harmless floating spook card, and Sam actually had to remind himself this was the same THING that had killed as many people as she had. Had tried to kill them. And if he just _left_ her there, she would continue to kill. Sam knew he had to finish the job. Especially if she had done something to Dean…

And hell if he thought it was quiet before, because THIS was quiet. The only sound he heard was the faint tick-ticking of his watch, mocking him the passage of seconds he couldn't afford to be losing. He wasn't even sure he was breathing, and his eyes were so wide his face hurt. And his next full thought was, _well, what the fuck do I do now?_

He scanned the area quickly, analytical brain calculating in seconds the distance from him to the spirit; from him to the hole; from DeWitt to the spirit; from the spirit to the hole. Calculating possible escape routes, and how long it would take him to get a match out of his pocket, lit, and tossed down into that hole without the flame going out, _and_ if he could manage all of that before he was thrown down again.

Honestly, the odds weren't in his favor; Callie's translucent form was hovering just a little too close to the open hole of her grave, and the whole scene was just a little too far away from where he was. But there was nothing else for him to do, and a taunting little ass of a voice in his head said, _Dean could make it_.

And that was pretty much it.

Sam rose just the slightest, balanced on the toes of his shoes and the flattened palm of his left hand, and groped in the pocket of his jeans with his right. His fingers closed on the matchbook and he made a mental note to buy a friggin' lighter when he realized it was going to take two hands to get the match lit, and that meant he was going to have to risk moving even more. And risk drawing Callie's attention, which thankfully continued to be fixed solely upon her dumbstruck father.

Neither living nor dead DeWitt had moved in what felt like hours, but had probably been no longer than a couple of minutes. Sam started counting in his head as he watched the silent and still pair, and when he hit twenty he sat back on his heels and lit a match as quickly as he could.

As quickly as he could was still not quite quick enough. _Lighter. Next stop for gas, next stop for a friggin' SNICKERS BAR…buy a fucking LIGHTER. _

Callie might not have been looking at Sam, but that apparently didn't mean she wasn't paying attention to what was going on behind her. She whirled and the matchbook was out of his hand and the small flame was out and Sam was, too, for a few bright black seconds as the back of his head connected with another tombstone behind him.

When Sam's vision righted itself and returned to a fairly normal spectrum of muted nighttime colors he looked up with a wince to see the shimmery adolescent spirit doing her little floaty dance right in front of him. She wasn't attacking him, she just…was. Staring at him. Sam couldn't help but stare back and wonder how such a violent ghost could look so young and innocent. He tore his eyes away from hers and looked wildly around at the moonlit ground, blades of grass ripped apart by his frantic fingers as he tried to find the lost book of matches, thinking, _Lighter, Sam. GOD._

He didn't see the matches, but he did see one of the discarded shotguns, waiting willingly against a tree trunk with barrels-a-full of spirit repellent. Sam scrabbled across the cold ground, using hands, feet, knees, anything to get to the weapon as quickly as he could, and was just reaching a hand out to the shiny, beautiful barrel of the gun when he was off the ground again, flying and spinning into a neighboring tree.

He hit the trunk of the tree with a solid smack on his right side, the lower back half of his rib cage. Bruise or break didn't matter at the moment. All that mattered was _GET UP GET UP GET UP_, because young, innocent Callie was starting to look a little more like the homicidal maniac her spirit had become.

Eyes that had been dark, shiny blue in the light of the near-full moon flamed to an embery orange, pupils rimmed in hell-fire red. Her whole presence became…darker, and THIS was the raging ghost that had been killing people for the past twenty years. That had killed –

_STOP IT._

The gun was still within reach, knocked to the ground but still, within reach. Sam stretched his right arm out for it but pulled back immediately with a hiss, cradling the arm to his side. Trees were hard, and it felt like this particular oak had taken out his entire midsection when he hit it.

_GET UP GET UP GET UP._

His fingers strained for the gun. Sam bit his lip and stretched his arm, scooting along the grass and dirt and keeping his eyes on the ghost.

Suddenly, the gun moved. Not because Sam had it in hand but because Callie looked at it. The gun, _his _gun, flew out of his reach, brushing his fingertips, and whirled around so he was facing down the barrel. And – _oh, shit _– she was going to do it.

The scratch and catch of a freshly lit match drew both of their attention.

Sam brought his arm back into his sore side, digging his elbow in, and met Nate DeWitt's eyes as he held the dropped matchbook in one hand, and a lit match aloft in the other. The man's eyes were wide – fear, disbelief, and a silent plea for forgiveness.

Callie's mouth opened, and her own plea slipped out as shaky and small as if it was her first word. "_Daddy_."

DeWitt's mouth dropped open and closed again over a strangled sob, and Sam thought for a second he wasn't going to be able to do it. He started to rise, pushed himself up to be leaning against the tree, but he didn't need to move any further.

"I'm sorry, baby," DeWitt said, choking on the words. "But you need to stop." Without another second's hesitation he dropped the lit match into the open grave-pit at his feet, and a wall of fire shot up out of the hole.

Sam dove down and pushed back against the tree to escape the intense heat swept up in the wind, right arm still braced against his side and the other over his face, protecting himself from the rush of warm and gritty air washing over him as he huddled there on the ground. He hid his face in the crook of his elbow and squeezed his eyes shut, not seeing anything and not sure if he wanted to anyways; just hoping DeWitt had the presence of mind to get the hell out of the way of the fire. His ears perked and stung as an unearthly shriek sounded overhead, and then everything was still.

The wind ruffling his hair became cold again, and Sam brought his arm away from his face, opening his eyes. He could barely see a foot in front of him the air was so thick and smoky. He sat up and leaned back against the tree, took a deep breath and hacked it back out, clutching his bruised side. "Mr. DeWitt?"

There was no answer.

"Nate?" Sam squinted, trying to force his eyes to see through the remaining smoke.

"Yeah."

It was broken and hollow and pained. Sam winced and pushed himself to his feet. The wind continued to blow out what remained of the fire and the smoke, and he could see DeWitt then, standing just as still as he had been, still up at the edge of the grave. In his hands was one of the stuffed animals that had been so carefully placed at Callie's tombstone. A small dog, it had maybe once been fluffy and tan and as full as life as an inanimate object _can_ be, but now was old, and ratty, and coated with soot.

DeWitt didn't look up at Sam, just bobbed his head. "Yeah," he said again, softer.

It was done. It was done and Callie was gone. Sam stood, arms out like he was ready to take flight, and wishing that was exactly what he could do, because there was just no way he was going to make it to wherever Dean was in time. No fucking way.

_In time for what?_ The thought stopped him even more, so he wasn't even in a state of not moving, he was in a complete state of absolute _nothing_, his mind so far out in front of his body. Knowing he should be moving, knowing he _needed_ to be moving, but his heart was being pulled in two opposite directions, and he just didn't know what to do.

As he stared down at that small stuffed dog DeWitt's eyes were as wide as the nearly full moon hanging over them, and even from where he stood he could see the glistening start of tears. Could see the older man's hands shaking, could see his mouth opening and shutting with nothing coming out. And he knew he needed to be out of there, and dozens of thoughts and images flashed through his head in a split-second.

_He just killed his daughter. _

Okay, so Callie had already been dead, but Sam was sure Nate DeWitt wasn't thinking rational thoughts at that particular moment. He was thinking he had killed his daughter, and Sam felt waves of sympathy for the man.

_I can't leave him like this._

Human beings were unstable, reckless, and wired in all kinds of shaky ways and Sam knew how bad it would be for him to leave DeWitt there, alone, in that condition. They had already left him to cover up his daughter's coffin once, what would having to do it again do to the man?

_Dean could be dead._

And it was that thought that won over all of the rest. It was the one that was going to win all along, and it hit home in such a way Sam finally had it together enough to get sounds to come out of his mouth. "Mr. DeWitt…"

The man looked up from the stuffed toy and at him, mouth still gaping, trying to comprehend what he had just seen and taken part of, and stared at Sam with those giant wet eyes.

Sam felt entirely too selfish, and he had a sense of what DeWitt had been feeling when Sam had asked for his help uncovering the coffin. "I can't…" he managed before he had to break off and look away. He found a spot on the ground, a charred patch of grass from a spark blown out of the hole. "I have to…"

He looked up and met DeWitt's eyes over the smokiness of his daughter's smoldering remains. The look must have conveyed every _I'm sorry_ and other desperate thought he was thinking, because Nate nodded, another barely perceptible bob of his head.

And that nod was all the permission Sam needed.

He paused for a fraction of a second, and then took a few crooked steps in no particular direction, just in a direction away from there and closer to Dean. He only got those few steps away and had to stop, because he REALLY didn't know what to do. He glanced around the cemetery, blinking blankly, not even sure he was really seeing it.

"He's on the highway."

Sam turned, eyes wide in confusion. "Yeah?"

DeWitt's eyes, however, were the clearest and sharpest they had been all night. Clear, sharp, and deadly serious. He shook his head slightly. "That's too far."

Sam frowned and took a breath, his brain not really functioning on the higher levels at the moment. "What – "

"Are you gonna walk to your brother, Sam?" Nate's eyes went to the ground, as if he was thinking the same thing Sam had been – he wasn't going to make it. "We're clear across town. That's at least ten miles, depending on where…well, on how far…"

"Yeah." Sam swallowed. He looked around again, panic rising inside. His side hurt and he was pretty sure that it was only bruises, no breaks, but still…he couldn't run that far. Ten miles…there was just no way.

"Take Jerry's truck."

"What?" Sam's extensive vocabulary was appallingly limited at the moment. He clenched his fists at his sides and shifted his weight. Every impulsive fiber of his being wanted to bolt and get to Dean, and all of the rational ones were telling him to just hold on for a second and think things through.

"The grounds keeper." DeWitt made a vague gesture over Sam's left shoulder, and his eyes followed the direction the man was pointing.

In the bright moonlight, he saw the outline of a small shed near the entrance of the cemetery. The windows of the small building were dark, and Sam had a mental-smack moment for not noticing the shed before. What if someone had heard the commotion, or seen the fire? Thankfully, the small building appeared to be empty. Next to the shed was a truck.

"He's a good guy," DeWitt continued. "Trusting." He gave Sam a meaningful look, a sympathetic tilt of his head. "Keys might even be in it."

Sam didn't know this man, not more than a sympathetic twinge for his pain and an understanding of the confusion he was surely feeling. Sam didn't know him, but in that moment, he LOVED him. "Thanks."

"Just go."

Sam paused for only a moment, and he somehow thought to grab his cell phone from where he had left it on the ground, a tiny voice that he fought to ignore telling him, _you might have to call an ambulance_. He turned away without a glance at DeWitt – neither could risk that at the moment – and jogged in the direction of the shed, leaving behind the weapons duffle and several piles of haphazardly thrown dirt and a broken man to clean it all up.

* * *

Sam gripped his cell phone tight enough to break it. It sure felt like he was going to break it; that or his fingers, whichever gave first. He pressed it tighter to his ear, like maybe he was just hearing things wrong. But no, it just kept ringing and ringing.

Click. _"This is Dean. If you need help, leave a message..." _

Sam swore, mostly to keep from crying, and hung up and hit the speed dial again. Just like he had the past eight tries. Ring. _Pick up, Dean. _Ring. _Pick up. _Ring. _Pick UP._

Ring. Click. _"This is Dean. If you need help, leave a message…"_

Sam swallowed and checked the speedometer. Ninety-five. It was a miracle he hadn't hit a building or something.

Jerry seemed to be just as trusting as Nate had said he was. The truck's door had been unlocked, and the keys were in fact inside, kept up in the sun visor. He'd nearly burned rubber out of there, not risking a glance back at DeWitt.

Halfway through the tiny town of Claremont, Sam found himself leaning forward over the steering wheel of the county truck, squinting and straining to see through an increasingly blurring windshield. He blinked stupidly and sat back.

He hadn't even noticed it had started raining.

Sam fumbled for the wiper controls and found that the view outside the windshield was still blurry, from water not coming from the sky. _Keep it together. _He increased pressure on both his phone and the accelerator, channeling what fear he could as he hit speed dial again.

Click. _"This is Dean. If you need help…"_

The town was now just a faraway collection of lights – yellow from the streetlights, blue and red from neon signs lining the main road, and green from the intersection he had just sped through. It had been red at the time.

After another few minutes, the lights faded out of view. Everything around him was dark, leaving Sam feeling very, very alone.

Click. _"This is Dean…"_

And them he saw them.

The skid marks. A good thirty feet's worth. _Shit._ Sam threw his phone to the side. He wanted to speed up but eased off the accelerator, barely keeping his eyes on the road, having the feeling that what he was looking for was no longer on the road anyway.

Up ahead on the right, the woods to the side of the road were set back from the road, divided by a steep drop-off, and warning/protecting drivers was that rusty old guardrail that the Impala had smacked into a few days before. The rail was nothing short of mutilated. Sam slammed the brakes and the truck gave a lurch and hydroplaning skid next to the worst of the damage, and he jumped out before the vehicle was at a full stop. An entire section of the rail had been ripped away from the post, hanging stiffly and swaying in the light wind with an audible creak.

"Dean!" Sam called, rushing to the edge of the rail with a few sloppy steps, his hurried feet slipping in the fresh mud. He stopped just short of taking his own swan dive over the edge, eyes frantically scanning the ground below.

He spotted Nate's black F150, on its side. His breath caught in his throat, and his feet seemed stuck in the sucking mud.

For about three seconds, he wasn't even sure Dean was in the truck, and the result was a sudden and near-paralyzing mixture of hope and panic assaulting his already shaky state of mind.

Hope. _Dean's not in the truck. _Being Dean,maybe he had outsmarted the ghost, had made some kind of action-movie leap out of the vehicle as it barreled through the old guardrail. Maybe he _had_ been in the truck when it had crashed through, but had been completely unharmed, and had started down the road back towards town, royally pissed and ready to pull out the best big-brother-to-the-rescue of all time.

Panic. _Dean's not in the truck._ He _had_ been hurt; Sam was LOOKING at the truck, for God's sake, how could he NOT be hurt. But he had pulled that invincible Dean Winchester bullshit out from wherever it was he pulled it from and had extricated himself from the mashed and misshapen hunk of metal. And he had started down the road back towards town, royally pissed and bloody and ready to try to pull out the best big-brother-to-the-rescue of all time.

But Dean WAS in the truck.

It was the black of night and the blur of the rain and the blood covering Dean's face that had made Sam think otherwise. A sudden flash of lightning lit up the scene below and he could see that Dean was in the truck. And he wasn't moving.

* * *

To be continued...


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

* * *

"God." Still-as-a-statue time was over, and Sam's arms flailed a bit as he started through the space in the ruined guardrail and down the slope, not caring much for finding footing or staying upright. He hadn't made it ten awkward, mucky steps when he slipped on a patch of slick grass and loose rocks and landed on the incline, flat on his back twenty feet from the mangled vehicle, and wasn't entirely sure he was going to be able to get back up.

He lay there for a few deep breaths and hard blinks, his already sore side screaming at him, freezing rainwater biting as it hit his face and exposed arms. But not numbing. _Get it together._ Because Dean was going to need him to have it together. There was blood…

And _that_ got Sam moving again. He grunted and pulled himself up out of the mud and was at the side of the vehicle in six seconds flat; clothes and hair sodden, steps weighted down with mud and something more.

Deep ruts were ripped through the grass and weeds the whole way down from the road, leading to where the truck now rested on its driver side. An uprooted sapling had been dragged along for a bit before snapping in half, trunk lying discarded to the side and branches poking out of the undercarriage of the truck.

As for the F150 itself, the passenger side had been mauled and was reflecting moonlight and rebounding raindrops from dips of twisted metal. The entire side of the considerable cab was smashed, the door unhinged and cradled in. This had been the hit that had done it, that had pushed the truck over the edge, and Sam was teetering on his own edge as he had a momentary and uncharacteristic urge to bring Callie back just so he could burn the spirit all over again.

What was visible of the bed of the truck was no better; a deep gouge ran the length of the truck, and Sam imagined sparks shooting out as it ground along the railing. Divots littered the side, every mark exaggerated by the hard shadows cast by the white moon. It was bad; really, really bad.

He really had taken _way_ too fucking long.

Sam ran around to the side/windshield of the truck, bracing himself on the glass before the sudden halt and slipping feet sent him back hard to the mud. "Dean." Sam's voice came out a cracked croak, and he barely heard it himself. He risked a moderately forceful bang of his palm against the windshield, trying to rouse his still brother. "_Dean._"

The lack of response tightened the knot in Sam's gut. He wasn't really expecting an answer, but _God_, anything would have been better than that silence. Silence, and the otherwise calming pit-pit of rain against warped metal.

He knelt down on his hands and knees and tried to get a look inside the cab, but it was too fucking dark and there was too much rain and hair in his eyes and he couldn't see a damn thing…

Another bolt of lightning streaked across the sky and, curse or blessing, he got a better look at his brother.

"Better" being a relative term.

Dean was somehow simultaneously splayed and crammed in the cramped space, his body shoved up in the corner of the cab, limbs at all angles. His left arm was above and behind his head, like he had thrown it up to keep from hitting the window. Red smears were visible on the plaster cast encasing the arm; he didn't keep from hitting everything. Red covered what was visible of his face, running from the cut at his hairline that had already been stitched once, and the steering wheel was pushed right up next to his side. Sam couldn't tell from where he was if Dean was pinned in place or not, but he didn't really care. He just wanted Dean out.

Sam pounded lightly on the glass again. "Dean!"

He was met once again with the harsh reality of silence. _Please, just please just be breathing. _He couldn't tell.

A scared and frustrated noise came from somewhere in Sam's throat, and he pulled himself to his feet. Sam wanted to be doing anything but just _standing _there, but he had no idea how to get to Dean. And Dean needed getting to.

He glanced back up at the road and the county truck. The dome light was on, and he could hear the faint _ding ding_ letting him know that the driver door was ajar.

Sam ran his hands through his soaking wet hair and swore. He spun back and ducked down, trying once again to see his brother in the dark. "Hang on, Dean." He knew Dean couldn't hear him, but he needed to say _something_. Needed to at least reassure himself.

Uphill was about a hundred times harder than downhill had been, and by the time Sam made it back up to the truck, he had knocked his knee on a rock twice, brought his hand down on a stick, and uttered every curse in his sizeable vocabulary. He flung open the passenger side door and nearly fell onto the bench seat, grabbing his phone from where he had left it behind.

He called for an ambulance, giving the dispatcher a sketchy account of a fictitious accident and the best estimate of where they were that he could, and hung up on the girl before she could tell him to stay on the line. He shoved the phone in his jeans pocket and turned to hurry back down to the truck, but paused. He eyes flicked to the bed of the truck. It _was_ a groundskeepers' truck…there was maybe something there that he could use to smash in the windshield.

Sam ripped back the bright blue tarp covering the bed, and said a silent little thank you that there was a small shovel. He grabbed it and ran back down as fast he could while staying on his feet.

Upon reaching the truck, he dropped to the ground once again, knees hitting with a splash and a suck at the same time, and put his face back up to the glass. Dean hadn't moved at all. He glanced around at the framing of the glass and the space he had to work with. It wouldn't be too difficult to knock in, it was already weak and webbed with cracks, but then he risked hurting Dean further. But Dean was crammed so far to the side, he might be okay.

Sam stood and took a shaky step back, hefting the shovel and aiming it tentatively at the weakest-looking section of the glass, a spot heavily cracked and somewhere hopefully far enough above Dean. There was a slight thud when the metal connected, and it might have just been his imagination that the cracked glass shifted, because he barely let it strike the glass before he pulled it back. Face set, he stabbed the shovel forward again, harder this time, and the glass gave. Sam winced as sparkling pieces rained down on Dean like confetti.

Sam rotated the shovel in his hands and used it to scoop the remaining section of the windshield outward. "Sorry, man," he said quietly as more bits of glass showered over his brother's prone form.

As soon as he had cleared away enough of the glass to squeeze all six-plus feet of himself in through the frame of the windshield, Sam tossed the shovel aside and ducked into the cab. There wasn't really anywhere that provided good footing; he planted his left foot on the center console and braced an arm in the corner over Dean's head. As soon as he was in, though, good footing was the last thing on Sam's mind. _Just please be breathing._

"Hey. Dean. Hey." He grabbed at Dean as gently as his fear and panic would allow. A creeping sense of déjà vu slithered and shivered its way down Sam's spine and landed somewhere in his gut, and he didn't like it at all. Didn't like how pale Dean's face was in the shafts of moonlight worming their way into the cab. Didn't like the way his brother's head lolled in his hands as his fingers scrambled to find a pulse.

But at least he found one this time.

Sam's ribs and all muscles in general protested the awkward crouch that he held leaning over his brother, but he kept the uncomfortable position, trying to assess the visible damage. He was relieved to see Dean wasn't being smashed in any way by the steering wheel, but the amount of blood on Dean's face concerned him, coming from small scratches that covered his face and the deeper gash on his forehead. Sam hissed in sympathy as he tilted Dean's head up, not wanting to jostle but needing to see where the blood on the cast had come from. As he lifted Dean's head, he saw the sprinkling of red that had dripped onto the glass below him. His left hand found the cut before his eyes saw it and he pulled it away, supporting Dean's head with his right.

"God, Dean," Sam breathed out, studying the blood on his fingertips. A small groan drew his attention, and he glanced down to see Dean's face fall into a pained frown as he started to shift. "Hey," he encouraged, bringing his brother's head back down as gently as he could.

Dean swallowed and let out a slow breath, working his eyes open with a few long blinks. His hand rose to wipe at his face, but it fell back heavily. He blinked wearily at Sam.

Sam grinned, leaning forward with hands hovering in that way that would really piss Dean off if he was fully aware of his surroundings. "Hey."

Dean rolled his head away from Sam and he reached out, not wanting Dean to move around too much, especially with his second head injury in such a short time.

Dean's frown deepened and his eyes fell shut again. "Dude. Person'l space."

Sam's grin widened, the knot in his stomach slowly starting to loosen. "Yeah, well get used to it. Ambulance is on its way."

Dean groaned and struggled to shove up on his elbow, trying to sit up without an inch of success. He fell back and continued to blink hard at Sam. "Why?" he breathed.

"Because I'm not moving you and I don't have a medical degree."

Dean's eyebrows rose and fell with a wince. He tried for a smile, and it came out a pained, crooked quirk of his mouth. "Get t' work on that."

Sam sat back on the center console, patting Dean's leg. "First thing in the morning, man."

Dean nodded and let out a breath but appeared far from relaxed. His eyes were squeezed shut, and he kept shifting uncomfortably, grimacing as his arms and legs met resistance against the glass of the window beneath him and the hard plastic of the dash board in his face.

Sam gripped his leg again. "Dean, man. Just stay still, alright? Don't move around."

"Yeah, yeah." Dean made a face but settled, resting his head against the glass of the window. After a moment, he raised his head a few inches, eyes widening pointedly at Sam's hand, still on his leg. "Hands?"

Sam pulled the arm into his lap with a smile. "Yeah."

"Yeah."

It was quiet for a moment; nothing but the sound of lessening raindrops on the metal overhead and random coughs and grunts from Dean. Sam's ears perked to the distant whine of sirens, and he immediately made as if to move, to go meet the ambulance at the road, but paused, looking back at Dean.

"Go, Sam." Dean's eyes were closed, but he was just like that. "Don't want them t' miss the turn," he joked.

"They're not going to miss it," Sam said softly, the image of the damaged rail popping into his mind. He stayed where he was, not wanting to leave Dean alone there for even a minute. The sirens grew closer, and Dean continued to wriggle.

"Sammy?"

"Yeah."

"Scratch under m'cast for me, would ya?"

* * *

By afternoon, Dean was fine. Of that, he was sure. It had been over twelve hours since he had come to in the tipped-over truck. That was more than enough time to heal, and he was FINE. A nap and some coffee, that's what he needed. Maybe a beer. He didn't need to _still_ be propped up in a flat hospital bed, and he didn't need the bag that was _still_ slowly dripping borrowed blood into his arm. He was positive it couldn't have been THAT bad. He'd certainly had plenty worse before.

Yes, he had only a vague recollection of the night's events. He remembered driving Nate's truck. He remembered creaking and groaning metal, sudden blackness and sudden Sammy, hands all inside his personal space. Sam had swallowed hard and shifted his weight and told him the truck was totaled, and Dean had frowned and told him it couldn't have been that bad.

Sam let out a crazy little laugh and scratched at his forehead. He had said "Yeah," and quietly excused himself to get some coffee.

Yes, he couldn't move a single muscle in his face without a tight pull from any of the numerous stitches on his face and head. The six that had popped on his forehead had been replaced with eleven new ones, and there were another twelve buried somewhere in his hair on the left side where he had connected a little too hard with his cast. And didn't he just feel like a dope for that. There were a dozen little itches all over his face; nicks from broken glass which Dean had insisted until he was practically yelling had probably been there _before_ Sam had smashed in the windshield.

Yes, every last inch of him was sore and tired and felt bruised to hell. Breathing wasn't a pleasant experience; there was heavy bruising from when he had slammed into the steering wheel, but nothing cracked or broken. Every one of his fingers felt huge, but only one was a real problem. A couple stitches had been sewn into his left middle finger, which he had split knuckle to knuckle at some point, and had actually managed to pop that middle knuckle out of place. The finger looked and felt really awkward, wrapped, splinted and sticking straight up of out of the cast, but it gave him an excuse for flipping Sam the bird at every opportunity. The cast had been cut off and replaced.

But he was fine. And all of the hovering by nurses and doctors was only encouraging Sam. His little brother had disappeared soon after they had gotten Dean settled in the ER, but returned fairly quickly, walking into Dean's room a little stiffly, dropped into a chair and hadn't moved in hours. He was currently slumped forward, all awkward angles with his head drooped and supported in his left hand braced on the arm of the plastic chair, his right arm wrapped tightly around his middle, legs crossed at the ankles and shoved under.

Dean glanced at the wall clock and then at the now-empty bag hanging on the IV stand next to him and was convinced that meant it was time to go. "Sam."

"Mm."

"We're going, okay?"

"Mm." Sam jerked and sat up, wincing slightly and blinking away the end of his little impromptu nap. "What?"

"I'm goin' crazy, man. I can't just sit here."

Sam shrugged and leaned back, adjusting his arms to cross over his midsection. He closed his eyes with a tired sigh. "Then lie down."

"Sam – "

"We're not going anywhere, Dean. You're staying in that bed."

"Dude. Sammy, I'm fine – "

The look Sam gave him was filled with an authority that Dean didn't know his brother had. He bit back the protest he had begun and sat back, only to go to work on a whole new one. "Sam – "

"_Dean_." Sam was wide-awake now, his eyes sharp and alert. "Just…please. For me?"

Dean rolled his eyes and shook his head, pissed Sam would pull that one out, and annoyed it worked. He crossed his arms awkwardly over his chest and huffed. "Whatever, man. But you're not allowed to pull _that_ bullshit again for at least six months."

"Deal." Sam laid his head back again, resting the nape of his neck against the hard plastic. He flung his legs out in front of him, and they reached all the way to the edge of Dean's bed.

Dean stared at Sam's shoes, plans involving tying his laces together starting to form in his head. These plans were pushed down and saved for later when he took in just how exhausted his little brother appeared. He wanted to tell him to go back to the motel and get some real rest, that Sam didn't need to worry about him checking himself out AMA, but what came out of his mouth was, "You don't _need_ to watch over me."

Sam didn't open his eyes. "And you don't _need_ to be an ass about it, but here we are."

Dean rolled his eyes again and reached for the remote control to the small television bolted up in the corner. He started flipping through the channels and stopped on some cooking show. Not because he was by any means fascinated by the program but because something had worked its way into his mind, something that he had forgotten to remember. "Sammy?"

Sigh. _Someone_ was pissy that his nap was being interrupted. "Yeah, Dean."

"The painkillers?" Dean started with just enough ice in his tone to get Sam's full attention, and boy, did it ever work. He bolted upright, looking like a guilty little boy. "You ever try something like that again, and you don't _even_ want to know what I'm going to do to you."

Sam coughed and fought a grin, despite Dean's lethal tone and glare. "Deal."

* * *

"You boys got lucky. My buddy Steve, over in Lowell County, he's got a '67 been sittin' on his yard for a few years now." Bernie rested an elbow on the top of his toolbox and inspected his filthy nail beds as Dean inspected the work he had done to the car.

It was Monday afternoon, and Dean was bending a little stiffly, kept wincing and rubbing his right hand against his chest, but seemed to be doing alright. Sam had stayed at the hospital all day Sunday, running down to the cafeteria a few times for some coffee and a questionable-looking turkey sandwich and right back up to Dean's room. He spent the day nodding off at random intervals, each time waking, usually because Dean was announcing loudly his annoyance and/or boredom with being held prisoner in the hospital, to feel even stiffer than he had the time before. He had been fairly successful in keeping Dean in his bed, up until the point Nate DeWitt had come by.

Naturally, an officer had been called to the hospital to talk to the two of them regarding the accident Sam had made up, to explain both Dean's and the truck's injuries, and the bruises on his own back and ribcage. DeWitt had been quiet and distant, not really meeting Sam's eyes as Sam recited the BS story he had put together in the waiting room. Sam understood – there were associations the man was probably not too eager to be making again anytime soon. The well-known, hardened officer had surprised the hospital staff by patting Sam on the shoulder, shooting a quick glance into Dean's room, and leaving it at that.

He had brought with him Sam's jacket and duffel from the cemetery and Dean's cell phone miraculously intact and recovered from his own totaled truck, and had been strangely careful, almost reverent, with the items as he placed them on the floor next to Sam. Sam wanted to know how he had explained away any inquiries as to how the two of them had come to be driving his truck, but the man, understandably, had not been very talkative.

Sam placed the phone on the little table by Dean's bed, and didn't think anything of it when Dean shot it almost threatening glances all Sunday evening. He understood in the morning, though, because first thing Monday – assuming work started at eleven AM for the pudgy mechanic – his brother got a call from Bernie.

"How soon can I get there?" Dean had given a light laugh that didn't match his situation. "Bernie, you insult me."

And then Bernie may have very well insulted his brother, because Dean sneered and hung up. He had sat up, awkwardly pulling at the IV line in his hand with the four available fingers on his left hand.

"Dean, what the hell are you doing?"

"Car's done." Dean pounded on the "call nurse" button on the side of his bed.

Sam had stood up, quickly crossing the small room to smack Dean's hand away. "Are you kidding me?"

Dean had stared at him with that Look, as if daring him to smack him ever again as he defiantly stabbed at the button again. "Do I look like I'm kidding?"

"No, you look like you need to be in the hospital."

"I'm fine, Sam. Really. A-OK."

"It's a _car._"

Dean deadpanned. "Is that what it is?"

"And you're about to fall over."

Dean had clumsily climbed out of the bed and was standing stubbornly beside it, very obviously swaying. He blinked and lifted his chin. "Am not."

He was to, and it was a good thing Sam had been right there next to him, or he might have hit the ground. The dizziness didn't last long, though, and Sam finally gave in to Dean's bitching around one o' clock. Dean signed himself out and they were at the body shop less than an hour later.

Sam didn't know a lot about cars, but the Impala looked good as new to him. Impressively so. Dean, however, appeared to have a different opinion. After a few clipped sentences to the mechanic, he had walked a long, slow loop around the entire car, and was now hovering near the new driver's side door with a deep frown.

"What is it?" Sam gathered up the courage to ask. Bernie's eyes darted between the two, whether angry or annoyed was hard to tell.

Dean shook his head, kneeling by the door with narrowed eyes. He brought up his right hand and lightly trailed his fingers along the edge, just under the window. Suddenly, he looked up sharply at Bernie. "This door wasn't black."

Bernie clucked his tongue and waved a hand, the other scratching at his considerable belly. "No one's going to be able to tell."

"_I _can tell."

"Kid, it could well be a damn month before I can get you a black door. You wanted it done quick, and I got it done quick. You should be thanking me." Bernie was getting pissed, his craftsmanship called into question, and he took a step forward, drawing all five and a half feet of himself up.

Dean rose as well, albeit a bit shakily. Sensing another heated argument between Dean and the mechanic was just getting started, Sam slid smoothly in between them. "You're right. It looks great," he said quickly.

When Dean said nothing, silently seething at his brother's betrayal, Sam nudged Dean with his elbow. "Doesn't it look great, Dean?" he asked pointedly, eyes wide.

Dean's lip was still curled in disgust as he stared at the now-black door. "Great," he echoed sarcastically.

Sam smiled politely at Bernie. "Thanks for all your help. Really."

Bernie chuckled. "Don't thank me yet." His face deadpanned. "You haven't seen the bill."

* * *

And they weren't going to. Sam had to work hard to keep his awed face blank as Dean pulled out some bogus auto insurance information; he had no idea how his brother had managed to swing that one. And Dean didn't tell him, ether. Just shrugged and said "What?" with that cocky-ass grin of his.

Bernie brought the car around to the curb, and as they left the body shop, they were surprised to find themselves face-to-face with Nate DeWitt.

"Hey," Sam said uneasily.

DeWitt looked between them, his expression hard to read. "I just…I guess I wanted to thank you boys."

Dean shook his head, holding up his good hand. "That's really not necessary – "

"No. No, it is." DeWitt placed his hands on his hips and squinted in the sunlight. "You risked your lives out there last night, for people that you'll never know. Never meet. That's really something."

Sam frowned. "Callie – "

"Callie was gone a long time ago. I know that." The officer's face was serious. "You boys did a good thing."

Neither Winchester knew how to respond. What they did was never really acknowledged in any way. They rarely got the chance to hear from an outside perspective what they were doing was meaningful. They did a lot of justifying their actions to themselves and one another, but to hear it from someone else…it was new.

They nodded, neither really aware they were mimicking the other.

Nate bobbed his head as well. "Yeah, well." He chuckled uneasily. "I'm still not so sure I want to see you boys back in town anytime soon."

Sam laughed lightly and ducked his head.

"You got it," Dean said.

An uneasy silence settled over the three now that what had needed to be said had been said. DeWitt's eyes roamed over the area, searching for somewhere else for his attention to go. He spotted the Impala at the curb and cocked his head, studying the car with a frown. "Huh."

Dean was next to him in a flash, face filled with worry. "What?"

"Was that door always black?"

* * *

They drove back to the motel in contemplative silence, Sam driving and Dean sulking in the passenger seat. Both were more then ready to get out of Claremont and to wherever they were going next. Wounds would heal and rest would come, but this town couldn't find itself in their rearview mirror quick enough.

Sam parked the Impala near the door to their room. He left a curiously wide-eyed Dean to gather their things, and went on to the manager's office with a good chunk of the remainder of Dean's pool hall winnings. He paid for the extra nights they had taken at the motel and checked them out.

He walked around the corner and neared their room, frowning when he saw Dean still standing outside of the door, rocking back and forth on his heels. "Don't you have the key?"

"Why would I have the key?" Dean frowned and shook his head very convincingly, but something was off.

Sam studied Dean carefully, knowing full-well his brother had demanded being in possession of at least the room key after Sam had kept the keys to the Impala out of his reach, telling him he wasn't in any condition to drive.

Dean had been pissed, arguing his health for a full ten minutes before shoving his wrapped and at-attention left middle digit in Sam's amused face. He had relinquished control of his baby to Sam, and Sam had handed over the room key – and besides, why would he be stupid enough to leave Dean to get their things if he didn't have the key to their room?

Then Sam saw Dean's eyes widen a little more than was completely necessary, and he sighed. "It's in the cast, isn't it?"

"I didn't…no."

* * *

The End.


End file.
